LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

      Of hungry Bedouins found me in the sand,

      Half mad with famine, and they took me up,

      And made a slave of me,—of me, a prince!

      All was fulfilled at last. I fled from them,

      In rags and sorrow. Nothing but my heart,

      Like a strong swimmer, bore me up against

      The howling sea of my adversity.

      At length o'er Sana, in the act to swoop,

      I stood like a young eagle on a crag.

      The traveller passed me with suspicious fear:

      I asked for nothing; I was not a thief.

      The lean dogs snuffed around me: my lank bones,

      Fed on the berries and the crusted pools,

      Were a scant morsel. Once, a brown-skinned girl

      Called me a little from the common path,

      And gave me figs and barley in a bag.

      I paid her with a kiss, with nothing more,

      And she looked glad; for I was beautiful,

      And virgin as a fountain, and as cold.

      I stretched her bounty, pecking, like a bird,

      Her figs and barley, till my strength returned.

      So when rich Sana lay beneath my eyes,

      My foot was as the leopard's, and my hand

      As heavy as the lion's brandished paw;

      And underneath my burnished skin the veins

      And stretching muscles played, at every step,

      In wondrous motion. I was very strong.

      I looked upon my body, as a bird

      That bills his feathers ere he takes to flight,—

      I, watching over Sana. Then I prayed;

      And on a soft stone, wetted in the brook,

      Ground my long knife; and then I prayed again.

      God heard my voice, preparing all for me,

      As, softly stepping down the hills,

      I saw the Imam's summer-palace all ablaze

      In the last flash of sunset. Every fount

      Was spouting fire, and all the orange-trees

      Bore blazing coals, and from the marble walls

      And gilded spires and columns, strangely wrought,

      Glared the red light, until my eyes were pained

      With the fierce splendor. Till the night grew thick,

      I lay within the bushes, next the door,

      Still as a serpent, as invisible.

      The guard hung round the portal. Man by man

      They dropped away, save one lone sentinel,

      And on his eyes God's finger lightly fell;

      He slept half standing. Like a summer wind

      That threads the grove, yet never turns a leaf,

      I stole from shadow unto shadow forth;

      Crossed all the marble court-yard, swung the door,

      Like a soft gust, a little way ajar,—

      My body's narrow width, no more,—and stood

      Beneath the cresset in the painted hall.

      I marvelled at the riches of my foe;

      I marvelled at God's ways with wicked men.

      Then I reached forth, and took God's waiting hand:

      And so He led me over mossy floors,

      Flowered with the silken summer of Shirar,

      Straight to the Imam's chamber. At the door

      Stretched a brawn eunuch, blacker than my eyes:

      His woolly head lay like the Kaba-stone

      In Mecca's mosque, as silent and as huge.

      I stepped across it, with my pointed knife

      Just missing a full vein along his neck,

      And, pushing by the curtains, there I was,—

      I, Adeb the Despised,—upon the spot

      That, next to heaven, I longed for most of all.

      I could have shouted for the joy in me.

      Fierce pangs and flashes of bewildering light

      Leaped through my brain and danced before my eyes.

      So loud my heart beat that I feared its sound

      Would wake the sleeper; and the bubbling blood

      Choked in my throat, till, weaker than a child,

      I reeled against a column, and there hung

      In a blind stupor. Then I prayed again;

      And, sense by sense, I was made whole once more.

      I touched myself; I was the same; I knew

      Myself to be lone Adeb, young and strong,

      With nothing but a stride of empty air

      Between me and God's justice. In a sleep,

      Thick with the fumes of the accursed grape,

      Sprawled the false Imam. On his shaggy breast,

      Like a white lily heaving on the tide

      Of some foul stream, the fairest woman slept

      These roving eyes have ever looked upon.

      Almost a child, her bosom barely showed

      The change beyond her girlhood. All her charms

      Were budding, but half opened; for I saw

      Not only beauty wondrous in itself,

      But possibility of more to be

      In the full process of her blooming days.

      I gazed upon her, and my heart grew soft,

      As a parched pasture with the dew of heaven.

      While thus I gazed, she smiled, and slowly raised

      The long curve of her lashes; and we looked

      Each upon each in wonder, not alarm,—

      Not eye to eye, but soul to soul, we held

      Each other for a moment. All her life

      Seemed centred in the circle of her eyes.

      She stirred no limb; her long-drawn, equal breath

      Swelled out and ebbed away beneath her breast,

      In calm unbroken. Not a sign of fear

      Touched the faint color on her oval cheek,

      Or pinched the arches of her tender mouth.

      She took me for a vision, and she lay

      With her sleep's smile unaltered, as in doubt

      Whether real life had stolen into her dreams,

      Or dreaming stretched into her outer life.

      I was not graceless to a woman's eyes.

      The girls of Damar paused to see me pass,

      I walking in my rags, yet beautiful.

      One maiden said, "He has a prince's air!"

      I am a prince; the air was all my own.

      So thought the lily on the Imam's breast;

      And lightly as a summer mist, that lifts

      Before the morning, so she floated up,

      Without a sound or rustle of a robe,

      From her coarse pillow, and before me stood

      With

Скачать книгу