Page:Flora (Heinemann 1919).djvu/70

 SEPHINA Black lacqueys at the wide-flung door

Stand mute as men of wood.

Gleams like a pool the ball-room floor—

A burnished solitude.

A hundred waxen tapers shine

From silver sconces; softly pine

’Cello, fiddle, mandoline,

To music deftly wooed—

And dancers in cambric, satin, silk,

With glancing hair and cheeks like milk,

Wreathe, curtsey, intertwine. The drowse of roses lulls the air

Wafted up the marble stair.

Like warbling water clucks the talk.

From room to room in splendour walk

Guests, smiling in the aery sheen;

Carmine and azure, white and green,

They stoop and languish, pace and preen

Bare shoulder, painted fan,

Gemmed wrist and finger, neck of swan;

And still the pluckt strings warble on;

Still from the snow-bowered, link-lit street

The muffled hooves of horses beat;

And harness rings; and foam-fleckt bit

Clanks as the slim heads toss and stare

From deep, dark eyes. Smiling, at ease,

Mount to the porch the pomped grandees

In lonely state, by twos, and threes,

Exchanging languid courtesies,

While torches fume and flare. 42