It was no dream,
Clearly, as in a picture, at my feet,
Among dark groves, the columned temples gleamed,
And I saw Athens, in the sunset, dying.
Dying; for though her shrines had not yet lost
One radiant grain of what lies crumbling now
Like a god’s bones upon the naked hills;
Though the whole city wound through gate on gate
Of visionary splendour to one height
Where, throned above this world, the Parthenon