THEY gave the whole long day to idle I KNEW a Princess: she was old, And what they would, would rather they would not so; Till he said, hending Crisp-haired, flat-featured, with a look Such as no dainty pen of gold Would write of in a Fairy Book. So bent she almost crouched, her face Was like the Sphinx's face, to me, Touched with vast patience, desert grace, And lonesome, brooding mystery. What wonder that a faith so strong As hers, so sorrowful, so still, Should watch in bitter sands so long. Obedient to a burdening will ! This Princess was a Slave, - like one And all the flowers, without a vail. Not of the Lamp, not of the Ring, man-like nothing compre- But of a subtler, fiercer Thing: Of all the wondrous guile That women won win themselves with, and bending Eyes of relentless asking on her the while, She was the Slave of Slavery. That at her side the whitest queen Were dark, her darkness was so fair. Nothing of loveliest loveliness This strange, sad Princess seemed to lack; Majestic with her calm distress She was, and beautiful though black: Then she-whom both his faith and fear Black, but enchanted black, and shut enchanted Far beyond words to tell, Feeling her woman's finest wit had wanted The art he had that knew to blunder so well In some vague Giant's tower of air, Built higher than her hope was. But The True Knight came and found her there. The Knight of the Pale Horse, he laid Shyly drew near, a little step, and mock- That hid her Self: as if afraid, ing, "Shall we not be too late For tea?" she said. "I'm quite worn out with walking: Yes, thanks, your arm. And will you -open the gate?" The cruel blackness shrank and fell. Then, lifting slow her pleasant sleep, And vanished up an awful Height. All the hearts are not dead, nor under the sod, That those breaths can blow open to Heaven and God! Ah, "Silver Street" leads by a bright golden road, -O, not to the hymns that in harmony flowed, But those sweet human psalms in the old-fashioned choir, To the girl that sang alto, -the girl that sang air! "Let us sing in His praise," the good minister said, All the psalm-books at once fluttered open at "York," Sunned their long dotted wings in the words that he read, While the leader leaped into the tune just ahead, And politely picked up the key-note with a fork, And the vicious old viol went growling along, At the heels of the girls, in the rear of the song. I need not a wing, -bid no genii come, With a wonderful web from Arabian loom, To bear me again up the river of Time, |