Afar from thee. See, then! Its transient woe
Thy babe e'en now forgets; and sweet and low
It babbles on my knee. In sooth, not long
Endure her griefs, and through my crooning song
She kisses me, recalling not the place
Whence she has come. Nay, nor her mother's face."
Long time stayed Lilith in that land. More calm
Each day she grew, for soft, like healing balm,
The child's pure love fell on her sin-sick soul.
Now oft among the crags, fleet-footed, stole
The maid, or lightly crossed the fertile plain.
And blithesome sang among the growing grain
That brake in billowy waves about her feet.
But when the wheat full ripened was, and sweet,
She plucked and ate. Thereat a shadowy pain,
A sense of sorrow, stirred that childish brain,
She wist not why. For it did surely seem
Before her waking thought, with pallid gleam
Of other days, dim pictures passed; of wood
And stream, beyond these mountain rims. And stood,
It seemed, midway a garden wide, a tree that bright
Like silver gleamed, and broad boughs light
Uplifted. Like ripened wheat the fruit thereon,
When low the westering sun upon it shone.
Then slow the maid did turn, and silent stand
At Lilith's side. And o'er that mountain land,
Down-looking, mused. Or lifted pensive eyes,
And gaze that questioned if in any wise
She might perceive the land she longing sought;
But of its stream, or garden, saw she naught.
Thereat Lilith with white lips drew more near,
And clasped in her lithe arms the child so dear.
And once again fled swift, a shadowy shape,
Across green fields. And heard, through silence, break
A voice she could not hush, that loudly wailed,
"My babe! Give me my babe!"
And Lilith paled,
And listening, heard, borne ever on the wind,
The tread of feet fast following behind.
Then westward turned, where once among new ways
With Eblis she had trod in other days,
When far they wandered. Thitherward she bent
Her timid steps, the babe upon her breast,
Until with travel worn her noontide rest
She took. And now a land of alien blooms
About them lay, outwafting strange perfumes.
And quaint defiles, that sloped behind a bay;
And level fields; and curly vines that lay
Thick clustered o'er with unripe fruit; and bent
Above them fragrant limes and