Page:Poems, Alan Seeger, 1916.djvu/68

 Tree-ferns, therefore, and potted palms they brought,

Tripods and urns in rare and curious taste,

Polychrome chests and cabinets inwrought

With pearl and ivory etched and interlaced,

Pendant brocades with massive braid were caught,

And chain-slung, oriental lamps so placed

To light the lounger on some low divan,

Sunken in swelling down and silks from Hindustan.

And there was spread, upon the ample floors,

Work of the Levantine's laborious loom,

Such as by Euxine or Ionian shores

Carpets the dim seraglio's scented gloom.

Each morn renewed, the garden's flowery stores

Blushed in fair vases, ochre and peach-bloom,

And little birds through wicker doors left wide

Flew in to trill a space from the green world outside.

And there was many a dainty attitude,

Bronze and eburnean. All but disarrayed,

Here in eternal doubt sweet Psyche stood

Fain of the bath's delight, yet still afraid

Lest aught in that palatial solitude

Lurked of most menace to a helpless maid.

Therefore forever faltering she stands,

Nor yet the last loose fold slips rippling from her hands.

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