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In the Temple of Theseus
AT Athens dwells the woman who hath bound | |
| My spirit with a spell, and made me hers | |
| Long as the warm blood pulses through my veins. | |
| Where stands the fane of Theseus, there she dwells, | |
| Within the shadow of Minerva’s shrine. | 5 |
| The cavern dungeon where old Socrates | |
| The hemlock drank; the azure-vaulted Pnyx | |
| Where great Demosthenes the state controlled | |
| With matchless eloquence, are near the spot | |
| Wherein she dwells, while circling round her rise | 10 |
| Her native mountains, smit with roseate gleams. | |
| Between them, gray old olive groves and wealth | |
| Of crimson flowers upon the storied plain, | |
| Whose rocky bourne is silvered by the foam | |
| Of the sapphire sea, lit by the islemen’s sails. | 15 |
| And there she dwells of whom I speak, amid | |
| The glories of her native land, how fair. | |
| While seasons change, her beauty changes not; | |
| The fleeting years go on, but still abides | |
| Her power to charm and steal the hearts of men. | 20 |
| Two thousand years have June’s soft zephyrs breathed | |
| The rose’s perfume on that noble brow, | |
| Two thousand years Hymettus’ bees have hummed | |
| To her the blooming of the almond buds, | |
| And still her features wear exquisite grace, | 25 |
| A tenderness ineffable, a smile | |
| So beautiful, that from the first my soul | |
| Was strangely moved, and to myself I thought, | |
| O that those eyes could but return my gaze, | |
| That round my neck those perfect arms would twine. | 30 |
| That I might gather kisses from those lips, | |
| And hear her warble love’s delicious strains. | |
| And thus I stood and mused upon her face, | |
| Stirred by a futile longing, while she wove | |
| The subtle thrall that made me hers forever. | 35 |
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