Page:Rudyard Kipling - A diversity of creatures.djvu/416

404 So they warred and trafficked only yesterday, my Cities. To-day there is no mark or mound of where my Cities stood. For the River rose at midnight and it washed away my Cities. They are evened with Atlantis and the towns before the Flood.

Rain on rain-gorged channels raised the water-levels round them, Freshet backed on freshet swelled and swept their world from sight, Till the emboldened floods linked arms and flashing forward drowned them— Drowned my Seven Cities and their peoples in one night!

Low among the alders lie their derelict foundations, The beams wherein they trusted and the plinths whereon they built— My rulers and their treasure and their unborn populations, Dead, destroyed, aborted, and defiled with mud and silt!

The Daughters of the Palace whom they cherished in my Cities, My silver-tongued Princesses, and the promise of their May— Their bridegrooms of the June-tide—all have perished in my Cities, With the harsh envenomed virgins that can neither love nor play.