Page:Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1900.djvu/843

 Some for the Glories of This World; and some Sigh for the Prophet's Paradise to come; Ah, take the Cash, and let the Credit go, Nor heed the rumble of a distant Drum!

Look to the blowing Rose about us—'Lo, Laughing,' she says, 'into the world I blow, At once the silken tassel of my Purse Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw.'

And those who husbanded the Golden grain And those who flung it to the winds like Rain Alike to no such aureate Earth are turn'd As, buried once, Men want dug up again.

II

Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day, How Sultán after Sultán with his Pomp Abode his destined Hour, and went his way.

They say the Lion and the Lizard keep The Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep: And Bahrám, that great Hunter—the wild Ass Stamps o'er his Head, but cannot break his Sleep.

I sometimes think that never blows so red The Rose as where some buried Cæsar bled; That every Hyacinth the Garden wears Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head.

And this reviving Herb whose tender Green Fledges the River-Lip on which we lean— Ah, lean upon it lightly! for who knows From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen!