Page:Thirty poems (IA thirtypoems00bryarich).pdf/99
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THE RUINS OF ITALICA.
93
With ivory carvings; here were laurel boughs
And sprays of jasmine gathered for their brows,
From gardens now a marshy, thorny waste.
Where rose the palace, reared for Cæsar, yawn
Foul rifts to which the scudding lizards haste.
Palaces, gardens, Cæsars, all are gone,
And even the stones their names were graven on.
IV.
Fabins, if tears prevent thee not, survey
The long dismantled streets, so thronged of old,
The broken marbles, arches in decay,
Proud statues, toppled from their place and rolled
In dust, when Nemesis, the avenger, came,
And buried, in forgetfulness profound,
And sprays of jasmine gathered for their brows,
From gardens now a marshy, thorny waste.
Where rose the palace, reared for Cæsar, yawn
Foul rifts to which the scudding lizards haste.
Palaces, gardens, Cæsars, all are gone,
And even the stones their names were graven on.
IV.
Fabins, if tears prevent thee not, survey
The long dismantled streets, so thronged of old,
The broken marbles, arches in decay,
Proud statues, toppled from their place and rolled
In dust, when Nemesis, the avenger, came,
And buried, in forgetfulness profound,