Page:Rudyard Kipling's verse - Inclusive Edition 1885-1918.djvu/325

 Across the fields, from Armod's dwelling-place, We heard Bisesa weeping where she passed To seek the Unlighted Shrine; the Red Horse neighed And followed her, and on the river-mint His hooves struck dead and heavy in our ears.

Out of the mists of evening, as the star Of Ao-Safai climbs through the black snow-blurs To show the Pass is clear, Bisesa stepped Upon the great grey slope of mortised stone, The Causeway of Taman. The Red Horse neighed Behind her to the Unlighted Shrine then fled North to the Mountain where his Stable lies.

They know who dared the anger of Taman, And watched that night above the clinging mists, Far up the hill, Bisesa's passing in.

She set her hand upon the carven door, Fouled by a myriad bats, and black with time, Whereon is graved the Glory of Taman In letters older than the Ao-Safai; And twice she turned aside and twice she wept, Cast down upon the threshold, clamouring For him she loved the Man of Sixty Spears, And for her father, and the black bull Tor, Hers and her pride. Yea, twice she turned away Before the awful darkness of the door, And the great horror of the Wall of Man Where Man is made the plaything of Taman, An Eyeless Face that waits above and laughs.

But the third time she cried and put her palms Against the hewn stone leaves, and prayed Taman To spare Er-Heb and take her life for price.