LITMIR.BIZ

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the faces fair and dark,

      The great arched brows, the parted lips, the teeth

      Like pearls a merchant picks to make a string,

      The satin-lidded eyes, with lashes dropped

      Sweeping the delicate cheeks, the rounded wrists

      The smooth small feet with bells and bangles decked,

      Tinkling low music where some sleeper moved,

      Breaking her smiling dream of some new dance

      Praised by the Prince, some magic ring to find,

      Some fairy love-gift. Here one lay full-length,

      Her vina by her cheek, and in its strings

      The little fingers still all interlaced

      As when the last notes of her light song played

      Those radiant eyes to sleep and sealed her own.

      Another slumbered folding in her arms

      A desert-antelope, its slender head

      Buried with back-sloped horns between her breasts

      Soft nestling; it was eating—when both drowsed—

      Red roses, and her loosening hand still held

      A rose half-mumbled, while a rose-leaf curled

      Between the deer's lips. Here two friends had dozed

      Together, wearing mogra-buds, which bound

      Their sister-sweetness in a starry chain,

      Linking them limb to limb and heart to heart,

      One pillowed on the blossoms, one on her.

      Another, ere she slept, was stringing stones

      To make a necklet—agate, onyx, sard,

      Coral, and moonstone—round her wrist it gleamed

      A coil of splendid colour, while she held,

      Unthreaded yet, the bead to close it up

      Green turkis, carved with golden gods and scripts.

      Lulled by the cadence of the garden stream,

      Thus lay they on the clustered carpets, each

      A girlish rose with shut leaves, waiting dawn

      To open and make daylight beautiful.

      This was the antechamber of the Prince;

      But at the purdah's fringe the sweetest slept—

      Gunga and Gotami—chief ministers

      In that still house of love.

      The purdah hung,

      Crimson and blue, with broidered threads of gold,

      Across a portal carved in sandal-wood,

      Whence by three steps the way was to the bower

      Of inmost splendour, and the marriage-couch

      Set on a dais soft with silver cloths,

      Where the foot fell as though it trod on piles

      Of neem-blooms. All the walls, were plates of pearl,

      Cut shapely from the shells of Lanka's wave;

      And o'er the alabaster roof there ran

      Rich inlayings of lotus and of bird,

      Wrought in skilled work of lazulite and jade,

      Jacynth and jasper; woven round the dome,

      And down the sides, and all about the frames

      Wherein were set the fretted lattices,

      Through which there breathed, with moonlight and cool airs,

      Scents from the shell-flowers and the jasmine sprays;

      Not bringing thither grace or tenderness

      Sweeter than shed from those fair presences

      Within the place—the beauteous Sakya Prince,

      And hers, the stately, bright Yasodhara.

      Half risen from her soft nest at his side,

      The chuddah fallen to her waist, her brow

      Laid in both palms, the lovely Princess leaned

      With heaving bosom and fast falling tears.

      Thrice with her lips she touched Siddartha's hand,

      And at the third kiss moaned: "Awake, my Lord!

      Give me the comfort of thy speech!" Then he—

      "What is with thee, O my life?" but still

      She moaned anew before the words would come;

      Then spake: "'Alas, my Prince! I sank to sleep

      Most happy, for the babe I bear of thee

      Quickened this eve, and at my heart there beat

      That double pulse of life and joy and love

      Whose happy music lulled me, but—aho!—

      In slumber I beheld three sights of dread,

      With thought whereof my heart is throbbing yet.

      I saw a white bull with wide branching horns,

      A lord of pastures, pacing through the streets,

      Bearing upon his front a gem which shone

      As if some star had dropped to glitter there,

      Or like the kantha-stone the great Snake keeps

      To make bright daylight underneath the earth.

      Slow through the streets toward the gates he paced,

      And none could stay him, though there came a voice

      From Indra's temple, 'If ye stay him not,

      The glory of the city goeth forth.

      Yet none could stay him. Then I wept aloud,

      And locked my arms about his neck, and strove,

      And bade them bar the gates; but that ox-king

      Bellowed, and, lightly tossing free his crest,

      Broke from my clasp, and bursting through the bars,

      Trampled the warders down and passed away.

      The next strange dream was this: Four Presences

      Splendid with shining eyes, so beautiful

      They seemed the Regents of the Earth who dwell

      On Mount Sumeru, lighting from the sky

      With retinue of countless heavenly ones,

      Swift swept unto our city, where I saw

      The golden flag of Indra on the gate

      Flutter and fall; and lo! there rose instead

      A glorious banner, all the folds whereof

      Rippled with flashing fire of rubies sewn

      Thick on the silver threads, the rays wherefrom

      Set forth new words and weighty sentences

      Whose message made all living creatures glad;

      And from the east the wind of sunrise blew

      With tender waft, opening those jewelled scrolls

      So that all flesh might read; and wondrous blooms

      Plucked in what clime I know not-fell in showers,

      Coloured

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