 | Fand and Other Poems |  |
He rose
Bewildered but compliant: a moment more
I had snatched him from the goddess easily;
When lo! there was a parting of the boughs,
And all the bower was filled with sudden light,
Richer than sunshine, as she came before us,
Fand, the most marvellous: ask me not to give thee
The measure of her beauty: there is none
That mortal women yield, and should I speak,
Striving to recreate her to thine eyes,
Faint is the image I should conjure up,
To wrong my tempted hero: this I know,
The uttermost perfection of her shape
Was steeped in colour, lovelier than eve's or morn's;
There is something of mere childhood in the morn,
And all the hues of sunset hint of death:
She had them all, but lit by noon's white light
Intense, the goddess life that glowed in her.
Bewildered but compliant: a moment more
I had snatched him from the goddess easily;
When lo! there was a parting of the boughs,
And all the bower was filled with sudden light,
Richer than sunshine, as she came before us,
9
The measure of her beauty: there is none
That mortal women yield, and should I speak,
Striving to recreate her to thine eyes,
Faint is the image I should conjure up,
To wrong my tempted hero: this I know,
The uttermost perfection of her shape
Was steeped in colour, lovelier than eve's or morn's;
There is something of mere childhood in the morn,
And all the hues of sunset hint of death:
She had them all, but lit by noon's white light
Intense, the goddess life that glowed in her.
| Fand and Other Poems | |