VANITY
Reading edition
VANITY
VANITY (1). (ON A PICTURE OF HERODIAS'S DAUGHTER BY LUINI.)
Alas, Salome! Could'st thou know How great man is,--how great thou art,-- What destined worlds of weal or woe Lurk in the shallowest human heart,-- From thee thy vanities would drop, Like lusts in noble anger spurned By one who finds, beyond all hope, The passion of his youth returned. Ah, sun-bright face, whose brittle smile Is cold as sunbeams flashed on ice! Ah, lips how sweet, yet hard the while! Ah, soul too barren even for vice! Mirror of Vanity! Those eyes No beam the less around them shed, Albeit in that red scarf there lies The Dancer's meed,--the Prophet's head.
VANITY (2.) I.
False and Fair! Beware, beware! There is a Tale that stabs at thee! The Arab Seer! he stripped thee bare Long since! He knew thee, Vanity! By day a mincing foot is thine: Thou runnest along the spider's line:-- Ay, but heavy sounds thy tread By night, among the uncoffined dead!
II.
Fair and Foul! Thy mate, the Ghoul, Beats, bat-like, at thy golden gate! Around the graves the night-winds howl: "Arise!" they cry, "thy feast doth wait!" Dainty fingers thine, and nice, With thy bodkin picking rice!-- Ay, but when the night's o'erhead, Limb from limb they rend the dead!