II.

Like and unlike—such counterpart
And contrast to that deathless dream of Art,
As gay glad Sunrise when it breaks
In splendour-smitten mist and sparkling dew,
To all the deep-impurpled tenderness
Of soft-illumined Sunset makes,
Though both impress
Their varying glories on the self-same view:
So like and so unlike—the Vision seemed
That on our Wanderer now in beauty beamed.

There, as the shy white crane, so rarely seen,
Stands proudly gentle and reserved,
Erect, but with her neck back-curved
Her breast's light-waving snow to preen—
There Amohia stood. Although downcast the rays
Of her clear-shining eyes—and on her cheek
The rosy flushings momently that broke
Through the clear olive, some distress bespoke—
Yet grandly winning and queenly-meek,
Erect the Maiden stood. About her all
Her affluent hair, unstirred by any breeze
Fell sheltering—a sable silky pall.
How like a strong ebullient swarm
Of hive-o'erflowing honey-bees
Forth issuing black, and glad a hundred ways,
Still soaking wet and dripping yet,
The tendrilled tresses spread and ran and clung
page 219 To all the balanced beauties of her form;
And sinuously streaming
Adown her polished shoulder palely gleaming,
And rippling ebon-soft over her rounded arm,
A natural drapery hung.

The moonlight's vague unsteady brightness
And depth of mellow shade,
Bewilderingly beauteous made
(So half-concealed and half-displayed)
The graces of a Form wherein it seemed
A bounding spirit of young elastic
Life essayed, In conscious exultation,
To float and flow and wind and wander
And on itself return in many a coy meander
And subtle undulation; And yet—as all perfection blends
Harmonious opposites for happiest ends—
Seemed ever in its wild luxuriance chained
And by a stronger spirit of proud reserve restrained,
Upholding the fine form in winged lightness—'.
As ivory serpents, held in graceful bond
Would twine of old about a silver Hermes-wand.