I see her beg a coral flute of red
From a tailed Triton; and on Ithakan rocks
High seated at the starry death of day,
When Selene rose from off her salty couch
To smile a glory on her face of sorrow,
Pipe forth sad airs that made the Sirens weep
In their green caves beneath the sodden sands,
And hoar Poseidon clear his wrinkled front
And still his surgy clamors to a sigh.

This do I see, and more; ah! yes, far more:
I see her, 'mid the lonely groves of Crete,
The wild hinds fright from the o'ervaulted green
Of thickest boscage, tangling their close covert,
With horror of her torches and her wail,
"Persephone! Persephone!" till the pines
Of rugged Dicte shuddered thro' their cones,
And Echo shrieked down in her deepest chasms
A wild reply unto her wild complaint;
As wild as when she voiced those maidens' woe,
Athenian tribute to stern Minos, king,
When coiling grim the Minotaur they saw
Far in his endless labyrinth of stone.

DIONYSOS.

"O Dionysos! Dionysos! the ivy-crowned!
O let me sing thy triumph ere I die!"

Within my sleep a Maenad came to me:
A harp of crimson agate strung with gold
Wailed 'neath her waxen fingers, and her heart
'Neath the white gauze, thro' which a moonlight shone,
Kept time with its wild throbbings to her song.

"Aegeus sleeps, O Dionysos! sleeps
Pale 'neath the tumbling waves that sing his name
Eternally at my dew-glist'ning feet.
And so he died, O Dionysos! died!
O let me sing thy triumph ere I die!

"With the shrill syrinx and the kissing clang
Of silver cymbals clashed by Ethiopes swart,
O, pard-drawn youth, thou didst awake the world
To joy and pleasure with thy sunny wine!
Mad'st India bow and the dun, flooding Nile
Grow purple in the radiance of the wine
Cast from the richness of Silenus' cup,
Whiles yet the heavens of heat saw dances wild
Whirl mid the redness of the Libic sands,
Which greedy drank the Bacchanalian draught
Spun from the giddy bowl, a rose-tinged mist,
O'er the slant edge, red twinkling in the eye
Of brazen Ra, fierce turning overhead.
What made gold Horus smile with golden lips?
Anubis dire forget his ghosts to lead
To Hell's profoundness, and then stay to sip
One winking bubble from the wine-god's cup?
What made Osiris, 'mid the palm