I.

In days when Nature—ere discharmed,
Undeified by Science—swarmed
With bright Divinities akin
To the forces that within
Her outward phases lurked terrific,
Or in genial ferment bland
Slumbered in her blissful breast,
In daimoniac delitescence;
Till with fervour too intense,
They would quicken and condense
And kindle into visible presence
And vitality specific,
Glowing on the too imprest
Keen sense in Shapes, appalling, grand
Grotesque or graceful—Phantoms haunting
And to human beauty moulding,
For quick-fancied Faith's beholding,
(Till all Earth was holy ground)
All the still-eyed Soul that broods
In wide wind-whispering solitudes—
Each cloudchase chequering hill and plain—
Moon-shadows—sunny silences—
page 216 Lone mists on fire in glens profound—
Old half-lit trunks of twisted trees—
And stealthy gleams in gloomy woods;—
In those old days what dearer dreaming
Than the Vision such deep feeling,
Instantaneously revealing
Traits of rare resemblance, fashioned
Out of things so diverse-seeming,
Ocean-foam and Love impassioned,—
As it flashed in pictured splendour
On the fine Ephesian brain?—
Will devotion true and tender
Ever at that shrine be wanting?
Ever poet's heart refrain
From a chance to touch again
That wan sweet faith and form enchanting—
Sweetest myth of all the train?
Of all the mystic Shapes and mighty.
Sovran, while Love's passionate pain
Can the senses charm and chain—
That dream divine of Aphrodite
Freshly risen from the main?

Lo! upon the amber sands,
Brilliant throbbing Apparition—
Proudly conscious, frankly smiling,
Sure of homage, love, submission;
Mostly triumph—some surprise,
In the dangerous innocent eyes,
Where, what witchery world beguiling
Lies in childlike archness hid!
Where the sense grows faint to mark
page 217 How the purple depths that glow
Like the velvet-petalled pansy, show
Dark—almost too lovely-dark—
Too like a stain almost,—amid
All that gleam of snowy brightness,
All her form's effulgent whiteness;
While the dazzling flood of tresses
Ripples like gold lines of light
In a hanging waterfall,
When you look from the curved rock-wall
Behind it, through its crystal pall;
Wavy sunbeams whence she presses
With those rosy-tipped fair fingers
Every diamond-drop that lingers
Lovingly in their bright recesses.
So was seen the Foam-born standing—
So for ever standeth she
In enamoured memory—
Darling Anadyomene!
While the leopard-sleek and fawning Sea
Round her plays caressingly,
Plays in many a broad festoon
Of foam-flowers—many a sliding sheet
Lovely-creaming, long-expanding,
Then dying off in a luxurious swoon;—-
As if Poseidon Jove-beguiled,
To beguile, attract, adore her,
Ere he stood confest before her,
Mocked the playful gambols mild
Of some creature of the wild;
And one sweet look to deserve,
But one glance so killing-sweet,
Kept the simple wile repeating,
page 218 Stealing swiftly, curve on curve,
Bounding forward and retreating,
Cowering, crouching at her feet.