SIGHTING ARABIA

My heart, that is Arabia, O see!

That talismanic sweep of sunset coast,

Which lies like richly wrought enchantment's ghost

Before us, bringing back youth's witchery!

“Arabian Nights!” At last to us one comes,

The crescent moon upon its purple brow.

Will not Haroun and Bagdad rise up now

There on the shore, to beating of his drums?

Is not that gull a roc? That sail Sindbad's?

That rocky pinnacle a minaret?

Does the wind call to prayer from it? O yet

I hear the fancy, fervid as a lad's!

“Allah il Allah,” rings it; O my heart,

Fall prostrate, for to Mecca we are near,

That flashing light is but a sign sent clear

From her, your houri, as her curtains part!

Soon she will lean out from her lattice, soon,

And bid you climb up to your Paradise,

Which is her panting lips and passion eyes

Under the drunken sweetness of the moon!

O heart, my heart, drink deeply ere they die,

The sunset dome, the minaret, the dreams

Flashing afar from youth's returnless streams:

For we, my heart, must grow old, you and I!