Nor stop till, where the cold sea raves By Lido's wet accursed graves,
They scoop mine, roll me to its brink, And... on Thy breast I sink!
Dip your arm o'er the boat-side, elbow-deep, As I do thus: were Death so unlike Sleep, Caught this way? Death's to fear from flame, or steel, Or poison doubtless; but from water-feel!
Go find the bottom! Would you stay me? There! Now pluck a great blade of that ribbon-grass To plait in where the foolish jewel was,
I flung away since you have praised my hair, 'Tis proper to be choice in what I wear.
Row home? must we row home? Too surely
Know I where its front 's demurely
Over the Giudecca piled;
Window just with window mating, Door on door exactly waiting,
All's the set face of a child : But behind it, where 's a trace Of the staidness and reserve, And formal lines without a curve, In the same child's playing-face? No two windows look one way O'er the small sea-water thread
Below them. Ah, the autumn day I, passing, saw you overhead!
First, out a cloud of curtain blew,
Then, a sweet cry, and last, came you— To catch your loory that must needs Escape just then, of all times then, To peck a tall plant's fleecy seeds, And make me happiest of men.
I scarce could breathe to see you reach So far back o'er the balcony,
(To catch him ere he climbed too high Above you in the Smyrna peach) That quick the round smooth cord of gold, This coiled hair on your head, unrolled, Fell down you like a gorgeous snake The Roman girls were wont, of old, When Rome there was, for coolness' sake To let lie curling o'er their bosoms.
Dear loory, may his beak retain
Ever its delicate rose stain
As if the wounded lotus-blossoms
Had marked their thief to know again!
Stay longer yet, for others' sake
Than mine! what should your chamber do?
-With all its rarities that ache
In silence while day lasts, but wake At night-time and their life renew,
Suspended just to pleasure you
-That brought against their will together These objects, and, while day lasts, weave Around them such a magic tether
That they look dumb: your harp, believe, With all the sensitive tight strings That dare not speak, now to itself Breathes slumbrously as if some elf Went in and out the chords, his wings Make murmur wheresoe'er they graze, As an angel may, between the maze Of midnight palace-pillars, on And on, to sow God's plagues have gone Through guilty glorious Babylon.
And while such murmurs flow, the nymph Bends o'er the harp-top from her shell, As the dry limpet for the lymph
Come with a tune he knows so well.
And how your statues' hearts must swell! And how your pictures must descend To see each other, friend with friend! Oh, could you take them by surprise, You'd find Schidone's eager Duke Doing the quaintest courtesies
To that prim Saint by Haste-thee-Luke: And, deeper into her rock den,
Bold Castelfranco's Magdalen You'd find retreated from the ken Of that robed counsel-keeping Ser-
As if the Tizian thinks of her,
And is not, rather, gravely bent On seeing for himself what toys Are these, his progeny invent, What litter now the board employs Whereon he signed a document
That got him murdered! Each enjoys Its night so well, you cannot break The sport up, so, indeed must make More stay with me, for others' sake.
To-morrow, if a harp-string, say, Is used to tie the jasmine back That overfloods my room with sweets, Contrive your Zorzi somehow meets My Zanze if the ribbon's black, The Three are watching; keep away.
Your gondola-let Zorzi wreathe
A mesh of water-weeds about
Its prow, as if he unaware
Had struck some quay or bridge-foot stair;
That I may throw a paper out
There's Zanze's vigilant taper; safe are we! Only one minute more to-night with me? Resume your past self of a month ago!
Be you the bashful gallant, I will be The lady with the colder breast than snow:
Now bow you, as becomes, nor touch my hand More than I touch yours when I step to land, And say, All thanks, Siora !—
And lips to lips! Yet once more, ere we part, Clasp me, and make me thine, as mine thou art!
He is surprised, and stabbed.
It was ordained to be so, Sweet,—and best
Comes now, beneath thine eyes, and on thy breast. Still kiss me! Care not for the cowards!
Only to put aside thy beauteous hair
My blood will hurt! The Three, I do not scorn To death, because they never lived: but I
Have lived indeed, and so—
-(yet one more kiss)—can die!
I AM a Goddess of the ambrosial courts, And save by Here, Queen of Pride, surpassed By none whose temples whiten this the world. Thro' Heaven I roll my lucid moon along; I shed in Hell o'er my pale people peace; On Earth, I, caring for the creatures, guard Each pregnant yellow wolf and fox-bitch sleek, And every feathered mother's callow brood,
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