There was the palace where her love had been;
Stones blackened by the fire and misplac’d
By roots of vines that fed upon the paste
Of all the pride where she had lived a queen.
Troy was no more than weeds and fire-flaked stone,
But still the straits ran roaring to the south,
And still the never-quiet winds were blown
With scent of meadow-sweet from Simois’ mouth.
Moon-Blossom.
Yet no Greeks were moving on the beaches,
No galleys of the Greeks came oaring in,
Nor did lancer scouts or parties ride the whin,
Bringing in or checking convoys from the river’s upper reaches
Where the forest pines begin.
And the forges were all gone, and all the fires
Of the camps and burnings of the dead.
And the grinding of the bronze-shod chariot-tyres
Rang no more.
Both in city and on shore
There were no more shouted orders, clash of arms, or marchers’ tread.
Rose-Flower.
All was manless now, uncared for; both the streams had left their courses.
There was marsh where corn had grown of old, and there, where Paris lay,
Was an apple-tree with fruit which fed the now wild Trojan horses,
That with bright teeth bit each other;
Earth made Greek and Trojan brother,
All the passion that had raged there now was dead and gone away.
Moon-Blossom.
Then she cried, “I caused the quarrel that brought death along these beaches,
I alone made Troy this ruin, I alone, from haste of youth,
From a women’s bent, that listens to a lie, if it beseeches;
Now I stand here old and friendless, having nothing but the truth.”
Rose-Flower.