Classic Poem

1

'Twas in the isle that Helios saw
Uprising from the sea a flower-tressed bride
To meet his kisses — Rhodes, the filial pride
Of god-taught craftsmen who gave Art its law:
She held the spindle as she sat,
Erinna with the thick-coiled mat
Of raven hair and deepest agate eyes,
Gazing with a sad surprise
At surging visions of her destiny
To spin the byssus drearily
In insect labour, while the throng
Of Gods and men wrought deeds that poets wrought in song.

2

Visions of ocean-wreathed Earth
Shone through with light of epic rhapsody
Where Zeus looked with Olympus and the sea
Smiled back with Aphrodite's birth;
Where heroes sailed on daring quests
In ships that knew and loved their guests;
Where the deep-bosomed matron and sweet maid
Died for others unafraid;
Where Pindus echoed to the Ionian shore
Songs fed with action and the love
Of primal work, where Themis saw
Brute Fear beneath her rod ennobled into awe.

3

Hark, the passion in her eyes
Changes to melodic cries
Lone she pours her lonely pain.
Song unheard is not in vain:
The god within us plies
His shaping power and moulds in speech
Harmonious a statue of our sorrow,
Till suffering turn beholding and we borrow,
Gazing on Self apart, the wider reach
Of solemn souls that contemplate
And slay with full-beamed thought the darling Dragon Hate.

4

" Great Cybele, whose ear doth love
The piercing flute, why is my maiden wail
Like hers, the loved twice lost, whose dear hands pale
Yearning, severed seemed to move
Thin phantoms on the night-black air?
But thou art deaf to human care:
Thy breasts impartial cherish with their food
Strength alike of ill and good.
The dragon and the hero, friend and foe,
Who makes the city's weal, and who its woe,
All draw their strength from thee; and what I draw
Is rage divine in limbs fast bound by narrow law.

5

But Pallas, thou dost choose and bless
The nobler cause, thy maiden height
And terrible beauty marshalling the fight
Inspire weak limbs with stedfastness.
Thy virgin breast uplifts
The direful aegis, but thy hand
Wielded its weapon with benign command
In Rivalry of highest gifts
With strong Poseidon whose earth-shaking roll
Matched not the delicate tremors of thy spear
Piercing Athenian land and drawing thence
With conquering beneficence
Thy subtly chosen dole
The sacred olive fraught with light and plenteous cheer.
What, though thou pliest the distaff and the loom?
Counsel is thine, to sway the doubtful doom
Of cities with a leaguer at their gate;
Thine the device that snares the hulk elate
Of purblind force and saves the hero or the State. "