neck and toucht his face,
And pressed it gently back to its warm place
Of pillowing. And Paris kissed her breast
And slept; but her heart's riot gave no rest
As quaking there she lay, awaiting doom.
Then afar off rose clamour, and the room
Was fanned with sudden light and sudden dark,
As on a summer night in a great park
Blazed forth you see each tuft of grass or mound,
Anon the drowning blackness, while the sound
Of Zeus's thunder hardens every close:
So here the chamber glared, then dipt, and rose
That far confused tumult, and now and then
The scurrying feet of passion-driven men.
Thrilling she waited with sick certainty
Of doom inexorable, while the struck city
Fought its death-grapple, and the windy height
Of Pergamos became a shambles. White
The holy shrines stared on a field of blood,
And with blank eyes the emptied temples stood
While murder raved before them, and below
And all about the city ran the woe
Of women for their children. Then the flame
Burst in the citadel, and overcame
The darkness, and the time seemed of broad day.
And Helen stared unwinking where she lay
Pillowing Paris.
Now glad and long and shrill
The second trumpet sounds. They have the hill--
High Troy is down, is down! Starting, he wakes
And turns him in her arms. His face she takes
In her two hands and turns it up to hers.
Nothing she says, nothing she does, nor stirs
From her still scrutiny, nor so much as blinks
Her eyes, deep-searching, of whose blue he drinks,
And fond believes her all his own, while she
Marvels that aught of his she e'er could be
In times bygone. But now he is on fire
Again, and urges on her his desire,
And loses all the sense of present needs
For him in burning Troy, where Priam bleeds
Head-smitten, trodden on his palace-floor,
And white Kassandra yieldeth up her flower
To Aias' lust, and of the Dardan race
Survive he only, renegade disgrace,
He only and Aineias the wise prince.
But now is crying fear abroad and wins
The very household of the shameful lover;
Now are the streets alive, for worse in cover
Like a trapt rat to die than fight the odds
Under the sky. Now women shriek to the Gods,
And men run witlessly, and in and out
The Greeks press, burning, slaying, and the rout