Pale-rose the dust lying thick upon the road: Grey-green the thirsty grasses by the way. The long flat silvery sheen of the vast champaign Shimmers beneath the blazing tide of noon. The blood-red poppies flame Like furnace-breaths: Like wan vague dreams the misty lavender Drifts greyly through the quivering maze, or seems Thus through the visionary glow to drift. On the far slope, beyond the ruin'd arch, A grey-white cloudlet rests, The cluster'd sheep alow: close, moveless all, And silent, save when faintly from their midst A slumberous tinkle comes, Cometh, and goeth. Low-stretch'd in the blue shade, Beneath the ruin The shepherd sleeps. Nought stirs. The wind moves not, nor with the faintest breath Toucheth the half-fallen blooms of the asphodels. Here only, where the pale pink ash Of the long road doth slowly flush to rose, A bronze-wing'd beetle moveth low, And sends one tiny puff of smoke-like dust Faint through the golden glimmer of the heat. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...AT THE ZOO IN SPAIN by CLARENCE MAJOR A NEW EARTH by WILLIAM ARTHUR DUNKERLEY SONG, FR. THE TWO GENTELEM OF VERONA by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE A PIPER by JAMES SULLIVAN STARKEY |