Sarojini Naidu

The Royal Tombs of Golconda

I MUSE among these silent fanes
Whose spacious darkness guards your dust;
Around me sleep the hoary plains
That hold your ancient wars in trust.
 
I pause, my dreaming spirit hears,
Across the wind’s unquiet tides,
The glimmering music of your spears,
The laughter of your royal brides.
 
In vain, O Kings, doth time aspire
To make your names oblivion’s sport,
While yonder hill wears like a tier
The ruined grandeur of your fort.
 
Though centuries falter and decline,
Your proven strongholds shall remain
Embodied memories of your line,
Incarnate legends of your reign.
 
O Queens, in vain old Fate decreed
Your flower-like bodies to the tomb;
Death is in truth the vital seed
Of your imperishable bloom
 
Each new-born year the bulbuls sing
Their songs of your renascent loves;
Your beauty wakens with the spring
To kindle these pomegranate groves.

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