And a warm air came up from underground,
And a flutter, as of a filmy shape unsepulchred,
That collected itself, and waited, and looked around:
Nothing was seen, but utterances could be heard:
Those of the goddess whose shrine was beneath the pile
Of the God with the baldachined altar overhead:
"And what did you get by raising this nave and aisle
Close on the site of the temple I tenanted?
"The notes of your organ have thrilled down out of view
To the earth-clogged wrecks of my edifice many a year,
Though stately and shining once--ay, long ere you
Had set up crucifix and candle here.
"Your priests have trampled the dust of mine without rueing,
Despising the joys of man whom I so much loved,
Though my springs boil on by your Gothic arcades and pewing,
And sculptures crude . . . Would Jove they could be removed!"
"--Repress, O lady proud, your traditional ires;
You know not by what a frail thread we equally hang;
It is said we are images both--twitched by people's desires;
And that I, like you, fail as a song men yesterday sang!"
* * *
And the olden dark hid the cavities late laid bare,
And all was suspended and soundless as before,
Except for a gossamery noise fading off in the air,
And the boiling voice of the waters' medicinal pour.
BATH.
SEVENTY-FOUR AND TWENTY
Here goes a man of seventy-four,
Who sees not what life means for him,
And here another in years a score
Who reads its very figure and trim.
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