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...ON THE THREE PHILOSOPHICAL POETS by GEORGE SANTAYANA THE DIRTY OLD MAN by WILLIAM ALLINGHAM WHISTLE, AND I'LL COME TO YOU by ROBERT BURNS THIRD BOOK OF AIRS: SONG 26. FIRST LOVE by THOMAS CAMPION SOTTO VOCE; TO EDWARD THOMAS by WALTER JOHN DE LA MARE TO THE MEMORY OF MR. OLDHAM by JOHN DRYDEN AT LULWORTH COVE A CENTURY BACK by THOMAS HARDY THE STORY OF AUGUSTUS WHO WOULD NOT HAVE ANY SOUP by HEINRICH HOFFMANN |