Arabia

Far are the shades of Arabia,

Where the Princes ride at noon,

'Mid the verdurous vales and thickets,

Under the ghost of the moon;

And so dark is that vaulted purple

Flower in the forest rise

And toss into blossom 'gainst the phantom stars

Pale in the noonday skies.

Sweet is the music of Arabia

In my heart, when out of dreams

I still in the thin clear mirk of dawn

Descry her gliding streams;

Her strange lutes on the green banks

Ring loud with the grief and delight

Of the dim-silked, dark-haird Musicians

In the brooding silence of night.

They haunt me - her lutes and her forests.

No beauty on earth I see

But shadowed with that dream recalls

Her loveliness to me:

Still eyes look coldly upon me,

Cold voices whisper and say -

'He is crazed with the spell of far Arabia,

They have stolen his wits away.'

- Walter de la Mare