Page:Keats - Poetical Works, DeWolfe, 1884.djvu/303

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And suffer'd in these temples: for that cause Thou standest safe beneath this statue's knees." "That I am favor'd for unworthiness, By such propitious parley medicined In sickness not ignoble, I rejoice, Ay, and could weep for love of such award." So answer'd I, continuing, "If it please, Majestic shadow, tell me where I am, Whose altar this, for whom this incense curls; What image this whose face I cannot see For the broad marble knees; and who thou art, Of accent feminine, so courteous?" Then the tall shade, in drooping linen veil'd Spoke out, so much more earnest, that her breath Stirr'd the thin folds of gauze that drooping hung About a golden censer from her hand Pendent; and by her voice I knew she shed Long-treasured tears. "This temple, sad and lone, Is all spared from the thunder of a war Foughten long since by giant hierarchy Against rebellion: this old image here, Whose carved features wrinkled as he fell, Is Saturn's; I, Moneta, left supreme, Sole goddess of this desolation." I had no words to answer, for my tongue, Useless, could find about its roofed home No syllable of a fit majesty To make rejoinder to Moneta's mourn: There was a silence, while the altar's blaze Was fainting for sweet food. I look'd thereon,