Orion.
71
The city's gardens, where no fountains played,
And hot stone temples in the sacred groves.
Such lack of moisture oft had been endured,
And e'en the latest winter, whose thick breath
Solemnly wafted o'er the Ægean sea,
Had not resigned a single peak of snow
To melt and flow down for the brooks of spring.
And hot stone temples in the sacred groves.
Such lack of moisture oft had been endured,
And e'en the latest winter, whose thick breath
Solemnly wafted o'er the Ægean sea,
Had not resigned a single peak of snow
To melt and flow down for the brooks of spring.
But since the breath of spring had stirred the woods,
Through which the joyous tidings busily ran,
And oval buds of delicate pink and green
Broke, infant-like, through bark of sapling boughs,—
The vapours from the ocean had ascended,
Fume after fume, wreath upon wreath, and floor
On floor, till a grey curtain upward spread
From sea to sky, and both as one appeared.
Now came the snorting and precipitous steeds
Of the Sun's chariot tow'rds the summer signs;
At first obscurely, then with dazzling beams;
And cleared the heavens, but held the vapours there,
In cloudy architecture of all hues.
The stately fabrics and the eastern pomps,
Tents, tombs, processions veiled, and temples vast,
Through which the joyous tidings busily ran,
And oval buds of delicate pink and green
Broke, infant-like, through bark of sapling boughs,—
The vapours from the ocean had ascended,
Fume after fume, wreath upon wreath, and floor
On floor, till a grey curtain upward spread
From sea to sky, and both as one appeared.
Now came the snorting and precipitous steeds
Of the Sun's chariot tow'rds the summer signs;
At first obscurely, then with dazzling beams;
And cleared the heavens, but held the vapours there,
In cloudy architecture of all hues.
The stately fabrics and the eastern pomps,
Tents, tombs, processions veiled, and temples vast,
