At last came silence. A slow kiss
Did crown his forehead after this;
His eyelids flew back for the bliss—
The lady stood beside his head,
Smiling a thought, with hair dispread;
The moonshine seemed dishevellèd
In her sleek tresses manifold
Like Danaë's in the rain of old
That dripped with melancholy gold:
But she was holy, pale and high
As one who saw an ecstasy
Beyond a foretold agony.
"Rise up!" said she with voice where song
Eddied through speech, "rise up; be strong:
And learn how right avenges wrong."
The poet rose up on his feet:
He stood before an altar set
For sacrament with vessels meet
And mystic altar-lights which shine
As if their flames were crystalline
Carved flames that would not shrink or pine.
The altar filled the central place
Of a great church, and toward its face
Long aisles did shoot and interlace,
And from it a continuous mist
Of incense (round the edges kissed
By a yellow light of amethyst)
Wound upward slowly and throbbingly,
Cloud within cloud, right silverly,
Cloud above cloud, victoriously,—