GOLDEN EYES
translated into English by: Laurence Hope (1865-1904)
- H Amber Eyes, oh Golden Eyes!
- Oh Eyes so softly gay!
- Wherein swift fancies fall and rise,
- Grow dark and fade away.
- Eyes like a little limpid pool
- That holds a sunset sky,
- While on its surface, calm and cool,
- Blue water lilies lie.
-
- Oh Tender Eyes, oh Wistful Eyes,
- You smiled on me one day,
- And all my life, in glad surprise,
- Leapt up and pleaded "Stay!"
- Alas, oh cruel, starlike eyes,
- So grave and yet so gay,
- You went to lighten other skies,
- Smiled once and passed away.
- Oh, you whom I name "Golden Eyes,"
- Perhaps I used to know
- Your beauty under other skies
- In lives lived long ago.
- Perhaps I rowed with galley slaves,
- Whose labour never ceased,
- To bring across Phoenician waves
- Your treasure from the East.
- Maybe you were an Emperor then
- And I a favourite slave;
- Some youth, whom from the lions' den
- You vainly tried to save!
- Maybe I reigned, a mighty King,
- The early nations knew,
- And you were some slight captive thing,
- Some maiden whom I slew.
- Perhaps, adrift on desert shores
- Beside some shipwrecked prow,
- I gladly gave my life for yours.
- Would I might give it now!
- Or on some sacrificial stone
- Strange Gods were satisfied,
- Perhaps you stooped and left a throne
- To kiss me ere I died.
- Perhaps, still further back than this,
- In times ere men where men,
- You granted me a moment's bliss
- In some dark desert den,
- When, with your amber eyes alight
- With iridescent flame,
- And fierce desire for love's delight,
- Towards my lair you come.
- Ah laughing, ever-brilliant eyes,
- These things men may not know,
- But something in your radiance lies,
- That, centuries ago,
- Lit up my life in one wild blaze
- Of infinite desire
- To revel in your golden rays,
- Or in your light expire.
- If this, oh Strange Ringed Eyes, be true,
- That through all changing lives
- This longing love I have for you
- Eternally survives,
- May I not sometimes dare to dream
- In some far time to be
- Your softly golden eyes may gleam
- Responsively on me?
- Ah gentle, subtly changing eyes,
- You smiled on me one day,
- And all my life in glad surprise
- Leaped up, imploring "Stay!"
- Alas, alas, oh Golden Eyes,
- So cruel and so gay,
- You went to shine in other skies,
- Smiled once and passed away.
"Golden Eyes" is reprinted from India's Love Lyrics. Trans. Laurence Hope. New York: John Lane Co., 1906. |
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