Love Among The Ruins

I.

Where the quiet-coloured end of evening smiles,

   Miles and miles

On the solitary pastures where our sheep

   Half-asleep

Tinkle homeward thro' the twilight, stray or stop

   As they crop—-

Was the site once of a city great and gay,

   (So they say)

Of our country's very capital, its prince

   Ages since

Held his court in, gathered councils, wielding far

   Peace or war.

II.

Now,—-the country does not even boast a tree,

   As you see,

To distinguish slopes of verdure, certain rills

   From the hills

Intersect and give a name to, (else they run

   Into one)

Where the domed and daring palace shot its  spires

   Up like fires

O'er the hundred-gated circuit of a wall

   Bounding all,

Made of marble, men might march on nor be  pressed,

   Twelve abreast.

III.

And such plenty and perfection, see, of grass

   Never was!

Such a carpet as, this summer-time, o'erspreads

   And embeds

Every vestige of the city, guessed alone,

   Stock or stone—-

Where a multitude of men breathed joy and woe

   Long ago;

Lust of glory pricked their hearts up, dread of shame

   Struck them tame;

And that glory and that shame alike, the gold

   Bought and sold.

IV.

Now,—-the single little turret that remains

   On the plains,

By the caper overrooted, by the gourd

   Overscored,

While the patching houseleek's head of blossom winks

   Through the chinks—-

Marks the basement whence a tower in ancient time

   Sprang sublime,

And a burning ring, all round, the chariots traced

   As they raced,

And the monarch and his minions and his  dames

   Viewed the games.

V.

And I know, while thus the quiet-coloured eve

   Smiles to leave

To their folding, all our many-tinkling fleece

   In such peace,

And the slopes and rills in undistinguished grey

   Melt away—-

That a girl with eager eyes and yellow hair

   Waits me there

In the turret whence the charioteers caught soul

   For the goal,

When the king looked, where she looks now, breathless, dumb

   Till I come.

VI.

But he looked upon the city, every side,

   Far and wide,

All the mountains topped with temples, all the glades'

   Colonnades,

All the causeys, bridges, aqueducts,—-and

then,    All the men!When I do come, she will speak not, she will stand,    Either handOn my shoulder, give her eyes the first embrace    Of my face,Ere we rush, ere we extinguish sight and  speech    Each on each.VII.In one year they sent a million fighters forth    South and North,And they built their gods a brazen pillar high    As the sky,Yet reserved a thousand chariots in full force—-    Gold, of course.Oh heart! oh blood that freezes, blood that burns!    Earth's returnsFor whole centuries of folly, noise and sin!    Shut them in,With their triumphs and their glories and the rest!    Love is best.