 | Voices and visions |  |
91
VENICE
Great lute, once played upon by history's hand,
But now lying indolent, with shattered shell;
Proud lily of civic pomp, whose floral spell,
Once daybreak's own, wears now such withering brand;
High sovereignty disthroned, whose lost command
The Campanile's thunder-throated bell,
The erratic sea-gull's cry, can fitliest knell;—
What speech may voice thy sorrow, obscure yet grand?
But now lying indolent, with shattered shell;
Proud lily of civic pomp, whose floral spell,
Once daybreak's own, wears now such withering brand;
High sovereignty disthroned, whose lost command
The Campanile's thunder-throated bell,
The erratic sea-gull's cry, can fitliest knell;—
What speech may voice thy sorrow, obscure yet grand?
Court, campo and palace glimmer bleared and wan;
Weeds fringe the marble of stairways, bridges, piers;
Dank labyrinths of canals crawl everywhere
Through squalor, desuetude!—O dying swan,
Thy death-song, freighted with five centuries' tears,
Flutes o'er the Adriatic its despair!
Weeds fringe the marble of stairways, bridges, piers;
Dank labyrinths of canals crawl everywhere
Through squalor, desuetude!—O dying swan,
Thy death-song, freighted with five centuries' tears,
Flutes o'er the Adriatic its despair!
Venice, 1898.
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