Not here, O Apollo!

Are haunts meet for thee.

But, where Helicon breaks down

In cliff to the sea,

Where the moon-silvered inlets

Send far their light voice
Up the still vale of Thisbe,
O speed, and rejoice!

On the sward at the cliff-top
Lie strewn the white flocks;
On the cliff-side the pigeons
Roost deep in the rocks.

In the moonlight the shepherds,
Soft lulled by the rills,

Lie wrapt in their blankets,
Asleep on the hills.

-What forms are these coming So white through the gloom? What garments out-glistening The gold-flowered broom?

What sweet-breathing presence
Out-perfumes the thyme?

What voices enrapture

The night's balmy prime?-

'Tis Apollo comes leading

His choir, the Nine.

-The leader is fairest,

But all are divine.

DONIS, a beautiful youth loved by the goddess

ADONIS
Aphrodite, was killed, while hunting, by a wild

boar. The goddess-called also Cytherea, Cypris,
and the Lady of Cyprus-bewails his death.

1 Translated by Sir Edwin Arnold.

Woe is me for Adonis! gone dead is the comely Adonis! Dead is the godlike Adonis! the young Loves wail for him, ai! ai!

Sleep no more, wrapped in thy mantles of Tyrian, lady of Cyprus!

Rise, don thy raiment of azure, pale mourner, and beat on thy bosom!

Tell out thy sorrow to all-he is dead, thy darling Adonis.

Ai! ai! wail for Adonis!—the young Loves wail for him, ai! ai! Hurt on the hill lies Adonis the beautiful; torn with the boar's tusk,

Torn on the ivory thigh with the ivory tusk, his low gasping Anguishes Cypris' soul: the dark blood trickles in rivers Down from his snowy side-his eyes are dreamily dimming Under their lids; and the rose leaves his lip, and the kisses

upon it

Fade, and wax fainter, and faintest, and die, before Cypris can snatch them;

Dear to the Goddess his kiss, though it be not the kiss of the

living;

Dear but Adonis wists nought of the mouth that kissed him a-dying.

Ai! ai! wail for Adonis-ai! ai! say the Loves for Adonis. Cruel! ah, cruel the wound on the thigh of the hunter Adonis, Yet in her innermost heart a deeper wears Queen Cytheræa. Round the fair dead boy his hounds pace, dismally howling; Round him the hill-spirits weep; but chiefest of all Aphrodite, Letting her bright hair loose, goes wild through the depths of the forest,

Passionate, panting, unkempt; with feet unsandaled, whose beauty

Thorn-bushes tear as she passes, and drip with the blood of the Goddess.

Bitterly, bitterly wailing, down all the long hollows she hurries, Calling him Husband and Love-her Boy-her Syrian Hunter.

Meantime dead in his gore lieth he—from groin unto shoulder Bloody; from breast to thigh; the fair young flank of Adonis, Heretofore white as the snow, dull now, and dabbled with

purple.

Ai! ai! woe for Adonis! the Loves say, "Woe for Adonis!” That which hath killed her sweet lover hath killed a grace which was godlike!

Perfect the grace seemed of Cypris so long as Adonis was living;

Gone is her beauty now— -ai! ai! gone dead with Adonis:

All the hills echo it—all the oaks whisper it, "Ah, for Adonis!"
Even the river-waves ripple the sorrows of sad Aphrodite,
Even the springs on the hills drop tears for the hunter Adonis;.
Yea, and the rose-leaves are redder for grief; for the grief

Cytherea

Tells in the hollow dells, and utters to townland and woodland.

Ai! ai! Lady of Cyprus, "Lo! dead is my darling Adonis!" Echo answers thee back, "Oh! dead is thy darling Adonis." Who, good sooth, but would say, Ai! ai! for her passionate

story?

When that she saw and knew the wound of Adonis-the death-wound

Saw the blood come red from the gash, and the white thigh a-waning,

Wide outraught she her arms, and cried, "Ah! stay, my Adonis! Stay for me, ill-starred love!—stay! stay! till I take thee the

last time,

Hold thee and fold thee, and lips meet lips, and mingle to

gether.

Rouse thee—a little, Adonis! kiss back for the last time, beloved!

Kiss me kiss me-only so long as the life of a kiss is!
So I may suck from thy soul to my mouth, to my innermost
heartbeat,

All the breath of thy life, and take the last of its love spell
Unto the uttermost end-one kiss! I will tenderly keep it
As I did thee, my Adonis, sith thou dost leave me, Adonis!
Far thou dost go and for long-thou goest to the region of
shadows,

Unto a hateful and pitiless Power, and I, the unhappy,
Live! and alack! am a goddess, and cannot die and go after;
Take thou my spouse, dark Queen,1 have here my husband,

as thou art

Stronger by far than I, and to thee goeth all that is goodly. Utterly hapless my fate, and utterly hopeless my grief is, Weeping my love who is dead, and hating the Fate that hath slain him.

Fled is my joy, like a dream; thou art dead, thrice lovely and longed for!

Queen Cytherea is widowed-the Loves in my bowers are

idle

Gone my charmed girdle with thee; why, rash one, went'st thou a-hunting?

Mad wert thou, being so fair, to match thee with beasts of the forest."

So grieved the Lady of Cyprus-the young Loves wept for her

sorrow,

Saying "Ai! ai! Cytherea! gone dead is her darling Adonis."

1 Persephone (or Proserpine), queen of the lower world, who, with Hades (Pluto), her husband, rules over the souls of the dead.