-and like a bird that waits,
Uncertain where to wend its flight,
My spirit lingered at the gates,
Which close upon that realm of light;

Till, slowly, all around grew clear,
And once again the light of day
Convinced me that I still was here,
Though all my dreams had passed away.

Once more I faced a world of Pain!
Of quivering nerves and sure decay,
Of helpless brutes, by millions, slain
To feed mankind a single day!

Of shivering children, scarred with blows,
Of hunted bird and tortured beast,
Of War, whose hideous programme shows
Its means of homicide increased.

The same old world of greed and hate,
Of selfish act and paltry aim,
Of private fraud and venal State,
Of deeds and doers steeped in shame!

What marvel if the spirit shrinks
From plunging in that turbid stream?
Or if, on waking thus, one thinks
That life was better in his dream?

Sweet, peaceful dreamland! I await
The favored hour, to pass again
Within thine asphodelian gate,
Beyond the miseries of men;

To find old pleasures, long since gone,
Perchance as vivid as of yore,
Or else to sleep,--life's curtains drawn,--
And reawaken ... nevermore.

ROME REVISITED

O sovereign Rome, still mistress of the heart,
As of the world in thy majestic prime,
Grand in thy ruins, peerless in thine art,
Rich in the memories of a past sublime,

Is thine the fault or mine that thou art changed,
And that I tread the new Tiberian shore
Convinced, alas! that we are now estranged,
And that for me thy charm exists no more?

I have grown older, but am not blase,
My hair has whitened, but my heart is young,
Still thrills my pulse the tomb-girt Appian Way,
Still stirs my soul the ancient Latin tongue.

Whence then this transformation, that pervades
Rome's very air, and leaves its blighting trace
Alike upon the Pincio's colonnades
And on the Mausoleum's rugged face?

The fault, dear Rome, is neither thine nor mine,
But that of vandals nurtured on thy breast,
Who, mad as "modern citizens" to shine,
Have fashioned thee like cities of the west.

Thy time-worn face, and figure deeply bowed
By countless sufferings for two thousand years,
Whose proper garment seemed to be a shroud,
Commanding reverence, sympathy and tears,

Are now bedecked with tawdry gems of paste;
Parisian robes thy withered limbs conceal;
Thy wrinkled cheeks are rouged; in vulgar taste
A modern watch-fob holds the Caesar's seal!

Where once imperial Triumphs proudly passed,