The Sphinx

    • In a dim corner of my room
    • For longer than my fancy thinks,
    • A beautiful and silent Sphinx
    • Has watched me through the shifting gloom.
    • Inviolate and immobile
    • She does not rise, she does not stir
    • For silver moons are nought to her,
    • And nought to her the suns that reel.
    • Red follows grey across the air
    • The waves of moonlight ebb and flow
    • But with the dawn she does not go
    • And in the night-time she is there.
    • Dawn follows Dawn, and Nights grow old
    • And all the while this curious cat
    • Lies crouching on the Chinese mat
    • With eyes of satin rimmed with gold.
    • Upon the mat she lies and leers,
    • And on the tawny throat of her
    • Flutters the soft and fur
    • Or ripples to her pointed ears.
    • Come forth my lovely seneschal,
    • So somnolent, so statuesque,
    • Come forth you exquisite grotesque,
    • Half woman and half animal,
    • Come forth my lovely languorous Sphinx,
    • And put your head upon my knee
    • And let me stroke your throat and see
    • Your body spotted like the Lynx,
    • And let me touch those curving claws
    • Of yellow ivory, and grasp
    • The tail that like a monstrous Asp
    • Coils round your heavy velvet paws.
    • A thousand weary centuries
    • Are thine, while I have hardly seen
    • Some twenty summers cast their green
    • For Autumn’s gaudy liveries,
    • But you can read the Hieroglyphs
    • On the great sandstone obelisks,
    • And you have talked with Basilisks
    • And you have looked on Hippogriffs
    • O tell me, were you standing by
    • When Isis to Osiris knelt,
    • And did you watch the Egyptian melt
    • Her union for Anthony,
    • And drink the jewel-drunken wine,
    • And bend her head in mimic awe
    • To see the huge pro-consul draw
    • The salted tunny from the brine?
    • And did you mark the Cyprian kiss
    • With Adon on his catafalque,
    • And did you follow Amanalk
    • The god of Heliopolis?
    • And did you talk with Thoth, and did
    • You hear the moon-horned Io weep
    • And know the painted kings who sleep
    • Beneath the wedge-shaped Pyramid?
    • Lift up your large black satin eyes
    • Which are like cushions where one sinks,
    • Fawn at my feet, fantastic Sphinx,
    • And sing me all your memories.
    • Sing to me of the Jewish maid
    • Who wandered with the Holy Child,
    • And how you led them through the wild,
    • And how they slept beneath your shade.
    • Sing to me of that odorous
    • Green eve when crouching by the marge
    • You heard from Adrian’s gilded barge
    • The laughter of Antinous,
    • And lapped the stream, and fed your drouth,
    • And watched with hot and hungry stare
    • The ivory body of that rare
    • Young slave with his pomegranate mouth.
    • Sing to me of the Labyrinth
    • In which the two-formed bull was stalled,
    • Sing to me of the night you crawled
    • Across the temple’s granite plinth
    • When through the purple corridors
    • The screaming scarlet Ibis flew
    • In terror, and a horrid dew
    • Dripped from the moaning Mandragores,
    • And the great torpid crocodile
    • Within the great shed slimy tears,
    • And tore the jewels from his ears
    • And staggered back into the Nile,
    • And the Priests cursed you with shrill psalms
    • As in your claws you seized their snake
    • And crept away with it to slake
    • Your passion by the shuddering palms.
    • Who were your lovers, who were they
    • Who wrestled for you in the dust?
    • Which was the vessel of your Lust,
    • What Leman had you every day?
    • Did giant lizards come and crouch
    • Before you on the reedy banks?
    • Did Gryphons with great metal flanks
    • Leap on you in your trampled couch,
    • Did monstrous hippopotami
    • Come sidling to you in the mist
    • Did gilt-scaled dragons writhe and twist
    • With passion as you passed them by?
    • And from that brick-built Lycian tomb
    • What horrible Chimaera came
    • With fearful heads and fearful flame
    • To breed new wonders from your womb?
    • Or had you shameful secret guests
    • And did you harry to your home
    • Some Nereid coiled in amber foam
    • With curious rock-crystal breasts;
    • Or did you, treading through the froth,
    • Call to the brown Sidonian
    • For tidings of Leviathan,
    • Leviathan of Behemoth?
    • Or did you when the sun was set,
    • Climb up the cactus-covered slope
    • To meet your swarthy Ethiop
    • Whose body was of polished jet?
    • Or did you while the earthen skiffs
    • Dropt down the gray Nilotic flats
    • At twilight, and the flickering bats
    • Flew round the temple’s triple glyphs
    • Steal to the border of the bar
    • And swim across the silent lake
    • And slink into the vault and make
    • The Pyramid your lupanar,
    • Till from each black sarcophagus
    • Rose up the painted, swathed dead,
    • Or did you lure unto your bed
    • The ivory-horned Trageophos?
    • Or did you love the God of flies
    • Who plagued the Hebrews and was splashed
    • With wine unto the waist, or Pasht
    • Who had green beryls for her eyes?
    • Or that young God, the Tyrian,
    • Who was more amorous than the dove
    • Of Ashtaroth, or did you love
    • The God of the Assyrian,
    • Whose wings that like transparent talc
    • Rose high above his hawk-faced head
    • Painted with silver and with red
    • And ribbed with rods of Oreichalch?
    • Or did huge Apis from his car
    • Leap down and lay before your feet
    • Big blossoms of the honey-sweet,
    • And honey-coloured nenuphar?
    • How subtle secret is your smile;
    • Did you love none then? Nay I know
    • Great Ammon was your bedfellow,
    • He lay with you beside the Nile.
    • The river-horses in the slime
    • Trumpeted when they saw him come
    • Odorous with Syrian galbanum
    • And smeared with spikenard and with thyme.
    • He came along the river bank
    • Like some tall galley argent-sailed
    • He strode across the waters, mailed
    • In beauty and the waters sank.
    • He strode across the desert sand,
    • He reached the valley where you lay,
    • He waited till the dawn of day,
    • Then touched your black breasts with his hand.
    • You kissed his mouth with mouth of flame,
    • You made the horned-god your own,
    • You stood behind him on his throne;
    • You called him by his secret name,
    • You whispered monstrous oracles
    • Into the caverns of his ears,
    • With blood of goats and blood of steers
    • You taught him monstrous miracles,
    • While Ammon was your bedfellow
    • Your chamber was the steaming Nile
    • And with your curved Archaic smile
    • You watched his passion come and go.
    • With Syrian oils his brows were bright
    • And wide-spread as a tent at noon
    • His marble limbs made pale the moon
    • And lent the day a larger light,
    • His long hair was nine cubits span
    • And coloured like that yellow gem
    • Which hidden in their garments’ hem,
    • The merchants bring from Kurdistan.
    • His face was as the must that lies
    • Upon a vat of new-made wine,
    • The seas could not insapphirine
    • The perfect azure of his eyes.
    • His thick, soft throat was white as milk
    • And threaded with thin veins of blue
    • And curious pearls like frozen dew
    • Were broidered on his flowing silk.
    • On pearl and porphyry pedestalled
    • He was too bright to look upon
    • For on his ivory breast there shone
    • The wondrous ocean-emerald,-
    • That mystic, moonlight jewel which
    • Some diver of the Colchian caves
    • Had found beneath the blackening waves
    • And carried to the Colchian witch.
    • Before his gilded galiot
    • Ran naked vine-wreathed corybants
    • And lines of swaying elephants
    • Knelt down to draw his chariot,
    • And lines of swarthy Nubians
    • Bore up his litter as he rode
    • Down the great granite-paven road,
    • Between the nodding peacock fans.
    • The merchants brought him steatite
    • From Sidon in their painted ships;
    • The meanest cup that touched his lips
    • Was fashioned from a chrysolite.
    • The merchants brought him cedar chests
    • Of rich apparel, bound with cords;
    • His train was borne by Memphian lords;
    • Young kings were glad to be his guests.
    • Ten hundred shaven priests did bow
    • To Ammon’s altar day and night,
    • Ten hundred lamps did wave their light
    • Through Ammon’s carven house,- and now
    • Foul snake and speckled adder with
    • Their young ones crawl from stone to stone
    • For ruined is the house, and prone
    • The great rose-marble monolith;
    • Wild ass or strolling jackal comes
    • And crouches in the mouldering gates,
    • Wild satyrs call unto their mates
    • Across the fallen fluted drums.
    • And on the summit of the pile,
    • The blue-faced ape of Horus sits
    • And gibbers while the fig-tree splits
    • The pillars of the peristyle.
    • The God is scattered here and there;
    • Deep hidden in the windy sand
    • I saw his giant granite hand
    • Still clenched in impotent despair.
    • And many a wandering caravan
    • Of stately negroes, silken-shawled,
    • Crossing the desert, halts appalled
    • Before the neck that none can span.
    • And many a bearded Bedouin
    • Draws back his yellow-striped burnous
    • To gaze upon the Titan thews
    • Of him who was thy paladin.
    • Go seek his fragments on the moor,
    • And wash them in the evening dew,
    • And from their pieces make anew
    • Thy mutilated paramour.
    • Go seek them where they lie alone
    • And from their broken pieces make
    • Thy bruised bedfellow! And wake
    • Mad passions in the senseless stone!
    • Charm his dull ear with Syrian hymns;
    • He loved your body; oh be kind!
    • Pour spikenard on his hair and wind
    • Soft rolls of linen round his limbs;
    • Wind round his head the figured coins,
    • Stain with red fruits the pallid lips;
    • Weave purple for his shrunken hips
    • And purple for his barren loins!
    • Away to Egypt! Have no fear;
    • Only one God has ever died,
    • Only one God has let His side
    • Be wounded by a soldier’s spear.
    • But these, thy lovers, are not dead;
    • Still by the hundred-cubit gate
    • Dog-faced Anubis sits in state
    • With lotus lilies for thy head.
    • Still from his chair of porphyry
    • Giant Memnon strains his lidless eyes
    • Across the empty land and cries
    • Each yellow morning unto thee.
    • And Nilus with his broken horn
    • Lies in his black and oozy bed
    • And till thy coming will not spread
    • His waters on the withering corn.
    • Your lovers are not dead, I know,
    • And will rise up and hear thy voice
    • And clash their symbols and rejoice
    • And run to kiss your mouth,- and so
    • Set wings upon your argosies!
    • Set horses to your ebon car!
    • Back to your Nile! Or if you are
    • Grown sick of dead divinities;
    • Follow some roving lion’s spoor
    • Across the copper-coloured plain,
    • Reach out and hale him by the mane
    • And bid him to be your paramour!
    • Crouch by his side upon the grass
    • And set your white teeth in his throat,
    • And when you hear his dying note,
    • Lash your long flanks of polished brass
    • And take a tiger for your mate,
    • Whose amber sides are flecked with black,
    • And ride upon his gilded back
    • In triumph through the Theban gate,
    • And toy with him in amorous jests,
    • And when he turns and snarls and gnaws,
    • Oh smite him with your jasper claws
    • And bruise him with your agate breasts!
    • Why are you tarrying? Get hence!
    • I weary of your sullen ways.
    • I weary of your steadfast gaze,
    • Your somnolent magnificence.
    • Your horrible and heavy breath
    • Makes the light flicker in the lamp,
    • And on my brow I feel the damp
    • And dreadful dews of night and death,
    • Your eyes are like fantastic moons
    • That shiver in some stagnant lake,
    • Your tongue is like a scarlet snake
    • That dances to fantastic tunes.
    • Your pulse makes poisonous melodies,
    • And your black throat is like the hole
    • Left by some torch or burning coal
    • On Saracenic tapestries.
    • Away! the sulphur-coloured stars
    • Are hurrying through the Western gate!
    • Away! Or it may be too late
    • To climb their silent silver cars!
    • See, the dawn shivers round the gray,
    • Gilt-dialled towers, and the rain
    • Streams down each diamonded pane
    • And blurs with tears the wannish day.
    • What snake-tressed fury, fresh from Hell,
    • With uncouth gestures and unclean,
    • Stole from the poppy-drowsy queen
    • And led you to a student’s cell?
    • What songless, tongueless ghost of sin
    • Crept through the curtains of the night
    • And saw my taper burning bright,
    • And knocked and bade you enter in?
    • Are there not others more accursed,
    • Whiter with leprosies than I?
    • Are Abana and Pharphar dry,
    • That you come here to slake your thirst?
    • False Sphinx! False Sphinx! By reedy Styx,
    • Old Charon, leaning on his oar,
    • Waits for my coin. Go thou before
    • And leave me to my crucifix,
    • Whose pallid burden, sick with pain,
    • Watches the world with wearied eyes.
    • And weeps for every soul that dies,
    • And weeps for every soul in vain.