I HAVE (in bronze) a tiny Adventuress of Greece, A little laughing Phryne, Upon my mantelpiece, And when I see her smiling Imagination strays Once more in brave, beguiling, Divine Athenian days! Cool marble courts are ringing As merry voices call, Where girls are garland-stringing For Springtime's festival; In lanes of linkéd lightness The roses rope, and flow Blood-red upon the whiteness Of chiselled Parian snow! I have a pot of pewter, And when the firelight gleams I too will turn transmuter Of commonplace to dreams. Then, though the year's at ember Once more high June doth reign And I in dreams remember,— And win the thing again! On turf of headland thymy, Where brine-washed breezes strive, I lay the subtle stymie, I drive the spanking drive; I see the grey tides sleeping, I watch the grey gulls wheel, Till through the dusk come creeping The lights of distant Deal! O pewter and O Phryne, Since both of you may bring Your visions blue and briny Or garlanded of Spring: I welcome you together Upon my mantelpiece, And love both magics, whether Of England or of Greece! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE BLINDED BIRD by THOMAS HARDY HURRAHING IN HARVEST by GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS DICING by AGATHIAS SCHOLASTICUS ON THE ENGINE BY NIGHT by ALEXANDER ANDERSON THE FROGS: AN 'AESCHYLEAN' CHORUS by ARISTOPHANES NEW JERSEY by FRED CLARE BALDWIN THE FIRST AMERICAN CONGRESS by JOEL BARLOW |