ESS ZEB-UN-NISSA
IN PRAISE OF HER OWN BEAUTY

(From the Persian)

When from my cheek I lift my veil,
The roses turn with envy pale,
And from their pierced hearts, rich with pain,
Send forth their fragrance like a wail.

Or if perchance one perfumed tress
Be lowered to the wind's caress,
The honeyed hyacinths complain,
And languish in a sweet distress.

And, when I pause, still groves among,
(Such loveliness is mine) a throng
Of nightingales awake and strain
Their souls into a quivering song.

INDIAN DANCERS

Eyes ravished with rapture, celestially panting,
what passionate bosoms aflaming with fire
Drink deep of the hush of the hyacinth
heavens that glimmer around them in
fountains of light;
O wild and entrancing the strain of keen music
that cleaveth the stars like a wail of desire,
And beautiful dancers with houri-like faces
bewitch the voluptuous watches of night.

The scents of red roses and sandalwood flutter
and die in the maze of their gem-tangled hair,
And smiles are entwining like magical serpents
the poppies of lips that are opiate-sweet;
Their glittering garments of purple are burning
like tremulous dawns in the quivering air,
And exquisite, subtle and slow are the tinkle
and tread of their rhythmical, slumber-soft feet.

Now silent, now singing and swaying and swinging,
like blossoms that bend to the breezes or showers,
Now wantonly winding, they flash, now they
falter, and, lingering, languish in radiant
choir;
Their jewel-girt arms and warm, wavering, lily-long
fingers enchant through melodious hours,
Eyes ravished with rapture, celestially panting,
what passionate bosoms aflaming with fire!

MY DEAD DREAM

Have you found me, at last, O my Dream?
Seven aeons ago
You died and I buried you deep under forests
of snow.
Why have you come hither? Who bade you
awake from your sleep
And track me beyond the cerulean foam of the
deep?

Would you tear from my lintels these sacred
green garlands of leaves?
Would you scare the white, nested, wild
pigeons of joy from my eaves?
Would you touch and defile with dead fingers
the robes of my priest?
Would you weave your dim moan with the
chantings of love at my feast?

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