Like an avenging angel with the sword
Of wrath unsheathed, careering toward thy home
Through flame and blood, thou rod'st: thy coming shook
The hundred gates of Rome.
She, who abused, beseeched thee, but in vain—
Humbled herself before thee; yet thy hate
Was unappeased; and, like one stricken dumb,
Rome gazed upon her fate.
But when Volumnia came—thy mother—she
Who bore thee 'neath her heart, and, at her side
The one who, in thy softer hours, with love
Thy trembling lip called bride,
Leading thy child—thy boy—the old hours came
Like south wind over thee; thy icy soul
Dissolved in tears; thy hard—thy iron heart
Acknowledged love's control,
And Rome was saved—Rome, who had wronged, was free!
—Thou lost!—O, never from the depths of Time
Came sweeter record of the power of love
Than this, in my poor rhyme.
Never was story fuller of the strength
Of love o'er hate: undimmed by age, it breathes
A perfume, and a crown around thy brow,
Coriolanus, wreathes!