Fountains fair as amethyst
On his granite lightly pour
All their irisated mist.
He is growing young once more.
Ah! yet he and I had birth
From Syene's veins of red.
But I keep my spot of earth.
He is living. I am dead.
VETERANS OF THE OLD GUARD
(December 15)
Driven by ennui from my room,
I walked along the Boulevard.
'Twas in December's mist and gloom.
A bitter wind was blowing hard.
And there I saw—strange thing to see!—
In drizzle and in daylight drear,
From out their dark abodes let free,
Dim, spectral shadow-shapes appear.
Yet 't is by night's uncanny hours,
By pallid German moonbeams cast
On old dilapidated towers,
That ghosts are wont to wander past.
It is by night's effulgent star
In dripping robes that elves intrigue
To bear beneath the nenuphar
Their dancer dead of his fatigue.
At night's mysterious tide hath been
The great review—of ballad writs—
Wherein the Emperor, dimly seen,
Numbered the shades of Austerlitz.