?

XII

Yet here thou mad'st thy choice: Love, Wisdom, Power,
As once before young Paris, they stood here!
Beneath them Ida, like one full-blown flower,
Shed her bloom earthward thro' the radiant air
Leaving her rounded fruit, their beauty, bare
To the everlasting dawn; and, in thy palm
The golden apple of the Hesperian isle
Which thou must only yield to the Most Fair;
But not to Juno's great luxurious calm,
Nor Dian's curved white moon,
Gav'st thou the sunset's boon,
Nor to foam-bosomed Aphrodite's rose-lipped smile.

XIII

Here didst thou make the eternal choice aright,
Here, in this hallowed haunt of nymph and faun,
They stood before thee in that great new light,
The three great splendours of the immortal dawn,
With all the cloudy veils of Time withdrawn
Or only glistening round the firm white snows
Of their pure beauty like the golden dew
Brushed from the feathery ferns below the lawn;
But not to cold Diana's morning rose,
Nor to great Juno's frown
Cast thou the apple down,
And, when the Paphian raised her lustrous eyes anew,

XIV

Thou from thy soul didst whisper--_in that heaven
Which yearns beyond us! Lead me up the height!
How should the golden fruit to one be given
Till your three splendours in that Sun unite
Where each in each ye move like light in light?
How should I judge the rapture till I know
The pain?_ And like three waves of music there
They closed thee round, blinding thy blissful sight
With beauty and, like one roseate orb a-glow,
They bore thee on their breasts
Up the sun-smitten crests
And melted with thee smiling into the Most Fair.

XV

Upward and onward, ever as ye went
The cities of the world nestled beneath
Closer, as if in love, round Ida, blent
With alien hills in one great bridal-wreath
Of dawn-flushed clouds; while, breathing with your breath
New heavens mixed with your mounting bliss. Deep eyes,
Beautiful eyes, imbrued with the world's tears
Dawned on you, beautiful gleams of Love and Death
Flowed thro' your questioning with divine replies
From that ineffable height
Dark with excess of light
Where the Ever-living dies and the All