Saga of the North: Bronze Into Iron -

Bronze Into Iron

Winds weather down the granite mountains,
Nile abandons his terraces,
Zinc has married tin and copper in the glazing fire;
While gnome-like black folk seek the hill-hid caves,
And red-haired warriors, glistening blue with woad,
Dash through oak forests in small bell-hung chariots.
Altar-fires twinkle at Stonehenge;
Men burn in wicker cages at Mona;
Odin's ravens commence to spy out the Earth.
Southward, pride solidifies in pyramids
Over the selfish sleep of Theban kings;
While Memnon wearies,
Singing of the mornings — mornings — mornings
Ever streaming from the east,
Like rows of shuttles dragging wefts of day
Across the sombre warp of purple nights;
Weaving the patient pattern of the years
And new things on sustaining webs of old,
The while the Star goes whirling, passing on
The web of life slow changed from bronze to iron.

ON THE FRONT OF A PYLON ,
OCHRE AGAINST THE STONE,
THE ROYAL WIFE DINES
IN PROFILE WITH PHARAOH.
UNDER THE OBSIDIAN LINEN
THE LINES OF HER LIMBS
SLIDE VOLUPTUOUSLY
INTO HER LONG, POINTED SHOES.