Thomas Hardy

Genoa and the Mediterranean.

O epic-famed, god-haunted Central Sea,
 Heave careless of the deep wrong done to thee
When from Torino’s track I saw thy face first flash on me.
 
 And multimarbled Genova the Proud,
 Gleam all unconscious how, wide-lipped, up-browed,
I first beheld thee clad—not as the Beauty but the Dowd.
 
 Out from a deep-delved way my vision lit
 On housebacks pink, green, ochreous—where a slit
Shoreward 'twixt row and row revealed the classic blue through it.
 
 And thereacross waved fishwives’ high-hung smocks,
 Chrome kerchiefs, scarlet hose, darned underfrocks;
Since when too oft my dreams of thee, O Queen, that frippery mocks:
 
 Whereat I grieve, Superba! . . . Afterhours
 Within Palazzo Doria’s orange bowers
Went far to mend these marrings of thy soul-subliming powers.
 
 But, Queen, such squalid undress none should see,
 Those dream-endangering eyewounds no more be
Where lovers first behold thy form in pilgrimage to thee.
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