And here, in a court, wide, estraded,
Rich tulips, like carbuncles, bloomed,
And jonquils and roses:—and lories,
And cockatoos, brilliant in glories
Of plumes, like great blossoms illumed,
Winged, splashed in a fountain perfumed:
Kept captive by network of braided,
Spun gold where stone galleries gloomed.
IV
From nipples of back-bending Peris
Of gold, glowing auburn, in rays
The odorous fountain sprang calling:
I heard through the white water’s falling,—
As soft as the zephyr that plays
With moonlight on bloom-haunted ways,—
A music; a sound, as if fairies
Touched wind-harps whose chords were of rays.
V
I followed: through corridors paneled
With sandal; through doorways deep-draped
With stuffs of Chosroës, rich-garded
With Indian gold; up the corded
Stone stairway, bronze-dragoned, wing-shaped:
Through moon-spangled hangings escaped—
’Twixt pillars of juniper channeled—
To a room constellated and draped.
VI
As in legends of witchcraft: a vassal
Of visions beholds naught yet hears
Sweet voices that call and he follows,—
So me, like the fragrance of aloes,
That chamber with song, it appears,
Surrounded; the song of the spheres ...
My soul found your soul such a castle—
Your love is the music it hears.
CONSECRATION
She speaks.
Last night you told me, where we, parting, waited,
Of love somehow I’d known before you told.—
Long, long ago, perhaps, this love was fated,
For why was it made suddenly so old?