In the British Museum
Shafts of light, that poured from the August sun,
Glowed on long red walls of the gallery cool;
Fell upon monstrous visions of ages gone,
Still, smiling Sphinx, winged and bearded Bull.
With burnished breast of ebon marble, queen
And king regarded full, from a tranquil brain
Enthroned together, conquered Time; serene
In spite of wisdom, and older than ancient pain.
Hither a poor woman, with sad eyes, came,
And vacantly looked around. The faces vast,
Their strange motionless features, touched with flame,
Awed her: in humble wonder she hurried past;
And shyly beneath a sombre monument sought
Obscurity; into the darkest shade she crept
And rested: soon, diverted awhile, her thought
Returned to its own trouble. At last she slept.
Not long sweet sleep alone her spirit possest.
A dream seized her: a solemn and strange dream.
For far from home in an unknown land, opprest
By burning sun, in the noon’s terrible beam
She wandered; around her out of the plain arose
Immense Forms, that high above her stared.
Calm they seemed, and used to human woes;
Silent they heard her sorrow, with ears prepared.
Now like a bird, flitting with anxious wings,
Imprisoned within some vast cathedral’s aisles,
Hither and thither she flutters: to each she brings
Her prayer, and is answered only with grave smiles.
Indescribably troubled, ‘Crush me,’ she cries,
‘Speak, speak, or crush me!’ The lips are dumb.
—She woke, no longer in shadow, the sun on her eyes,
And sighed, and arose, and returned to her empty home.
