THE NET OF VULCAN

From peaks that clove the heavens asunder

The hunchback god with sooty claws

Loomed o'er the night, a cloud of thunder,

And hurled the net of mortal laws;

It flew, and all the world grew dimmer;

Its blackness blotted out the stars,

Then fell across the rosy glimmer

That told where Venus couched with Mars.

And, when the steeds that draw the morning

Spurned from their Orient hooves the spray,

All vainly soared the lavrock, warning

Those tangled lovers of the day:

Still with those twin white waves in blossom,

Against the warrior's rock-broad breast,

The netted light of the foam-born bosom

Breathed like a sea at rest.

And light was all that followed after,

Light the derision of the sky,

Light the divine Olympian laughter

Of kindlier gods in days gone by:

Low to her lover whispered Venus,

“The shameless net be praised for this —

When night herself no more could screen us

It snared us one more hour of bliss.”