So, in the yellow palankeen
We swung along in state between
Twinkling domes of gold and green
Through the rich bazaar,
Where the cross-legged merchants sat,
Old and almond-eyed and fat,
Each upon a gorgeous mat,
Each in a cymar;
Each in crimson samite breeches,
Watching his barbaric riches.
Cherry blossom breathing sweet
Whispered o’er the dim blue street
Where with fierce uncertain feet
Tawny pirates walk:
All in belts and baggy blouses,
Out of dreadful opium houses,
Out of dens where Death carouses,
Horribly they stalk;
Girt with ataghan and dagger,
Right across the road they swagger.
And where the cherry orchards blow,
We saw the maids of Miyako,
Swaying softly to and fro
Through the dimness of the dance:
Like sweet thoughts that shine through dreams
They glided, wreathing rosy gleams,
With stately sounds of silken streams,
And many a slim kohl-lidded glance;
Then fluttered with tiny rose-bud feet
To a soft frou-frou and a rhythmic beat
As the music shimmered, pursuit, retreat,
“Hands across, retire, advance!”
And again it changed and the glimmering throng
Faded into a distant song.
Song
The maidens of Miyako
Dance in the sunset hours,
Deep in the sunset glow,
Under the cherry flowers.
With dreamy hands of pearl
Floating like butterflies,
Dimly the dancers whirl
As the rose light dies;
And their floating gowns, their hair
Upbound with curious pins,
Fade thro’ the darkening air
With the dancing mandarins.
And then, as we went, the tall thin man
Explained the manners of Old Japan;
If you pitied a thing, you pretended to sneer;
Yet if you were glad you ran to buy
A captive pigeon and let it fly;
And, if you were sad, you took a spear
To wound yourself, for fear your pain
Should quietly grow less again.
And, again he said, if we wished to find
The mystic City that enshrined
The stone so few on earth had found,
We must be very brave; it lay
A hundred haunted leagues away,
Past many a griffon-guarded ground,
In depths of dark and curious art,
Where passion-flowers enfold apart
The Temple of the Flaming Heart,
The City of the Secret Wound.
About the fragrant fall of day
We saw beside the twisted way
A blue-domed tea-house, bossed with gold;
Hungry and thirsty we entered in:
How should we know what Creeping Sin
Had breathed in that Emperor’s ear who sold
His own dumb soul for an evil jewel
To the earth-gods, blind and ugly and cruel?...
We drank sweet tea as his tale was told,
In a garden of blue chrysanthemums,
While a drowsy swarming of gongs and drums
Out of the sunset dreamily rolled.