Grey ambergris, pink damask-roses' oil,
Deep murex purple, beards or lips vermilion
As Abu Musa's flaming scarlet soil
I have borne—and dung and lacquer. I have flooded
Bazaars with poppy-seed and filigree.
Men little guess the stuff that I have studied,
Or what their vaunted traffic seems to me.
"I am hardened to all wonderments and stories—
My ears have borne the hardest of my task—
I have carried pearls from Lingah up to Tauris,