THE RAPE OF AURORA
by: George Meredith (1828-1909)
- EVER, O
never,
- Since dewy sweet Flora
- Was ravished by Zephyr,
- Was such a thing heard
- In the valleys so hollow!
- Till rosy Aurora,
- Uprising as ever,
- Bright Phosphor to follow,
- Pale Phoebe to sever,
- Was caught like a bird
- To the breast of Apollo!
-
- Wildly she flutters,
- And flushes all over
- With passionate mutters
- Of shame to the hush
- Of his amorous whispers:
- But O such a lover
- Must win when he utters,
- Thro' rosy red lispers,
- The pains that discover
- The wishes that gush
- From the torches of Hesperus.
-
- One finger just touching
- The Orient chamber,
- Unflooded the gushing
- Of light that illumed
- All her lustrous unveiling.
- On clouds of gold amber,
- Her limbs richly blushing,
- She lay sweetly wailing,
- In odours that gloomed
- On the God as he bloomed
- O'er her loveliness paling.
-
- Great Pan in his covert
- Beheld the rare glistening,
- The cry of the love-hurt,
- The sigh and the kiss
- Of the latest close mingling:
- But love, thought he, listening,
- Will not do a dove hurt,
- I know,--and a tingling,
- Latent with bliss,
- Prickt thro' him, I wis,
- For the Nymph he was singling.
"The Rape of Aurora" is
reprinted from Poetica Erotica. Ed. T.R. Smith. New York:
Crown Publishers, 1921. |
MORE
POEMS BY GEORGE MEREDITH |
|