CRASSUS.
What will you then?
ALICIA.
No gift from men.
Of my own free will I give you wit,
(O man so sorely in need of it!)
And happiness; and the flame that hath dwindled
On this dull hearth shall be rekindled.
But this you must swear:
To will, and to dare,
To seek the spirit and slay the sense;
And for this hour
To give me power
To lead you in silent obedience,
Though I bade you fall on your sword….
CRASSUS.
Enough!
I give my life as I gave my love.
ALICIA.
O! love you have not understood.
You have not guessed its secret food.
You have not seen its single eye;
But fear and doubt and jealousy
Have risen, and now your love is trembling
Like a mountebank dissembling
When his trick's detected. Come!
To find home we must leave home.
CRASSUS.
Starless and moonless, hidden in cloud,
The night's one flame of pearl.
ALICIA.
The bat flaps; the owl hoots aloud.
CRASSUS.
Lead on; I trust you, girl.
ALICIA.
You are bold to trust me; or, have you divined
My secret?
CRASSUS.
No; the crystal of your mind
Shows only faint disturbing images,
Things passing strange, as if enchanted seas
Kept their great swell upon it, and strange fish
Played in its oily depths. Some monstrous wish,
The shadow of some unspeakable desire,
Strikes my heart cold, and sets my brain on fire.
ALICIA.
Learn this, as we pass through the portico:
Fear nothing; there is nothing you can know!
And by these terraces and steps that gleam
Wintry, although the summer night is hot,
This - what we seek is never what we find!