Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, BUCOLIC COMEDY: LADY IMMORALINE; TO THE MEMORY OF ROBERT ROSS, by EDITH SITWELL


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

BUCOLIC COMEDY: LADY IMMORALINE; TO THE MEMORY OF ROBERT ROSS, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: From the great house platformed flat as a cage
Last Line: For beauty's bier.


FROM the great house platformed flat as a cage
Above the clouds' widened landing-stage,
We watch the carriages driving home
By the goggling and gilded dragons of foam.

"Beautiful carriages from Champs Elysee
Filled with fair maidens on cushions easy"
Drive by the gilt Second Empire sand
Where leaves of black gauze enliven the band.

"Do you remember
Semiramis,
Bright as September? . . .
Gone is her kiss. . . ."

Said Lady Immoraline . . . old is she
As a mummy. She sipped her black Bohea
With Sir Robert Walpole, the Emperor Nero,
And that old general, Caesar the hero.

The lovely lotus buds of the snow
Bloom into brightness, fading slow:
And now she drives, all shrunken and old
By the sea and the sands' Second Empire gold,

Where the spray seems like wheat-ears,
And Ethiopia's
Fruits -- cornucopias
For beauty's bier.





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net