The poems of Madison Cawein

Perhaps we lived in the days
Of the Khalif Haroun er Reshid;
And loved, as the story says
Did the Sultan's favorite one
And the Persian Emperor's son,
Ali ben Bekkar, he
Of the Kisra dynasty.

Do you know the story?—Well,
You were Haroun's Sultana.
When night on the palace fell,

A slave, through a secret door,—
Low-arched on the Tigris' shore,—
By a hidden winding stair
Brought me to your bower there.

Then there was laughter and mirth,
And feasting and singing together,
In a chamber of wonderful worth;
In a chamber vaulted high
On columns of ivory;
Its dome, like the irised skies,
Mooned over with peacock eyes;
Its curtains and furniture,
Damask and juniper.

Ten slave girls—so many blooms—
Stand, holding tamarisk torches,
Silk-clad from the Irak looms;
Ten handmaidens serve the feast,
Each maid like a star in the east;
Ten lutanists, lutes a-tune,
Wait, each like the Ramadan moon.

For you, in a stuff of Merv
Blue-clad, unveiled and jeweled,
No metaphor made may serve:
Scarved deep with your raven hair,

The jewels like fireflies there—
Blossom and moon and star,
The Lady Shemsennehar.

The zone that girdles your waist
Would ransom a Prince and Emeer;
In your coronet's gold enchased,
And your bracelet's twisted bar,
Burn rubies of Istakhar;
And pearls of the Jamshid race
Hang looped on your bosom's lace.

You stand like the letter I;
Dawn-faced, with eyes that sparkle
Black stars in a rosy sky;
Mouth, like a cloven peach,
Sweet with your smiling speech;
Cheeks, that the blood presumes
To make pomegranate blooms.

With roses of Rocknabad,
Hyacinths of Bokhara,—
Creamily cool and clad
In gauze,—girls scatter the floor
From pillar to cedarn door.
Then, a pomegranate bloom in each ear,
Come the dancing-girls of Kashmeer.

Kohl in their eyes, down the room,—
That opaline casting-bottles
Have showered with rose-perfume,—
They glitter and drift and swoon
To the dulcimer's languishing tune;
In the liquid light like stars
And moons and nenuphars.

Carbuncles, tragacanth-red,
Smoulder in armlet and anklet:
Gleaming on breast and on head,
Bangles of coins, that are angled,
Tinkle: and veils, that are spangled,
Flutter from coiffure and wrist
Like a star-bewildered mist.

Each dancing-girl is a flower
Of the Tuba from vales of El Liwa.—
How the bronzen censers glower!
And scents of ambergris pour,
And of myrrh, brought out of Lahore,
And of musk of Khoten! how good
Is the scent of the sandalwood!

A lutanist smites her lute,
Sings loves of Mejnoon and Leila:—
Her voice is an Houri flute;—

While the fragrant flambeaux wave,
Barbaric, o'er free and slave,
O'er fabrics and bezels of gems
And roses in anadems.

Sherbets in ewers of gold,
Fruits in salvers carnelian;
Flagons of grotesque mold,
Made of a sapphire glass,
Brimmed with wine of Shirâz;
Shaddock and melon and grape
On plate of an antique shape.

Vases of frosted rose,
Of alabaster graven,
Filled with the mountain snows;
Goblets of mother-of-pearl,
One filigree silver-swirl;
Vessels of gold foamed up
With spray of spar on the cup.

Then a slave bursts in with a cry:
“The eunuchs! the Khalif's eunuchs!—
With scimitars bared draw nigh!
Wesif and Afif and he,
Chief of the hideous three,
Mesrour!—the Sultan 's seen
'Mid a hundred weapons' sheen!”

Did we part when we heard this?—No!
It seems that my soul remembers
How I clasped and kissed you, so. ...
When they came they found us—dead,
On the flowers our blood dyed red;
Our lips together, and
The dagger in my hand.

University of Virginia Library

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