Page:The complete poems of Emily Bronte.djvu/365

Rh LIX

sunshine of a summer sun

On the proud domes of Elrington

Glows with a beam divinely bright

In one unquenched, unvarying light,

And high its archèd windows rise,

As if to invite the smiling skies;

And proud its mighty columns show

Between them ranked in haughty row;

And sweet and soft the solemn shade

By the o'erarching portals made.

The starry halls of Elrington

May glisten in that glorious sun,

For fêtes and feasts are given to-day

To noble Lords and Ladies gay;

And that vast city of the sea

Which round us lies so endlessly

Has hither sent its proudest train

To worship mirth and fly from pain.

The sunshine of a summer's sun

Glows o'er the graves of Elrington,

Where city walls spread wide around

The flower and foliage laden ground.

All round the hot and glaring sky

Bespeaks a mighty city nigh;

And through each opening in the shade

Palace and temple crown the glade.

So here an oasis stands

'Mid the wide wastes of Egypt's sands.