Page:Poems Elgee, 1907.djvu/42

VI.
By the tomb of queenly Isis,
 Where her fallen prophets wail,
Yet no hand has dared the crisis
 Of the lifting of the vail.
By the altar which the Grecian
 Raised to God without a name;
By the stately shrine Ephesian,
 Erostratus burned for fame.

VII.
By the Libyan shrine of Ammon,
 Where the sands are trod with care,
Lest we, bending to examine,
 Start the lion from his lair.
Shall we tread the halls Assyrian,
 Where the Arab tents are set;
Trace the glory of the Tyrian,
 Where the fisher speads his net?

VIII.
Shall we seek the "Mene, mene,"
 Wrote by God upon the wall,
While the proud son of Mandane
 Strode across the fated hall?
Shall we mourn the Loxian's lyre,
 Or the Pythian priestess mute?
Shall we seek the Delphie fire,
 Though we've lost Apollo's lute?

IX.
Ah! the world has sadder ruins.
 Than these wrecks of things sublime;
For the touch of man's misdoings
 Leaves more blighted tracks than Time
Ancient lore gives no examples
 Of the ruins here we find—
Prostrate souls for fallen temples,
 Mighty ruins of the mind.