The Sirens
ON DE B EAUMONT'S PICTURE " Les S IRÈNES . "
Dainty sea-maids! bright-eyed Sirens! laughing over dead men's graves!
What has drawn you from the inland to this wilderness of waves?
Why those lucent arms uptossing o'er your shoulders round and rare?
Why those musical throats bent back beneath the sunlight of your hair?
Oh, the bosoms' rosy treasures tempting tow'rd their fragrant home!
Oh, the ivory thighs unkirtled on the white flowers of the foam!
Bitter is the sea about you with the brine of daily tears,
In the sea-grave lie beneath you withered hearts and wasted years.
Back! ye deathward-singing Sirens! One by Galilee's calm sea
Calls you hence, — " O cease your angling, drop your nets, and follow me, " —
Calls you home to Love's high service in seclusion's holy glen,
But he never called you shoreward to be fishers after men.
Dainty sea-maids! bright-eyed Sirens! laughing over dead men's graves!
What has drawn you from the inland to this wilderness of waves?
Why those lucent arms uptossing o'er your shoulders round and rare?
Why those musical throats bent back beneath the sunlight of your hair?
Oh, the bosoms' rosy treasures tempting tow'rd their fragrant home!
Oh, the ivory thighs unkirtled on the white flowers of the foam!
Bitter is the sea about you with the brine of daily tears,
In the sea-grave lie beneath you withered hearts and wasted years.
Back! ye deathward-singing Sirens! One by Galilee's calm sea
Calls you hence, — " O cease your angling, drop your nets, and follow me, " —
Calls you home to Love's high service in seclusion's holy glen,
But he never called you shoreward to be fishers after men.
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