Showed lustful Jove misusing his high power,
When as a swan he won fair Leda's will,
And conquered Danaë in a golden shower.

Here was Diana, leading to the chase
Her kilted nymphs, her hounds with eyeballs burning;
And here was Hercules in woman's dress,
His warlike hand the peaceful distaff turning.

Not far from them frowned Sinai, bleak and wild,
Along whose slope lay Israel's nomad nation;
Next, one might see our Savior as a child
Amid the elders holding disputation.

Thus were these opposites absurdly blent--
The Grecian joy of living with the godly
Judean cast of thought!--while round them bent
The ivy's tendrils, intertwining oddly.

But--wonderful to say!--while dreamily
I gazed thereon with glance returning often,
Sudden methought that I myself was he,
The dead man in the splendid marble coffin.

Above the coffin by my head there grew
A flower for a symbol sweet and tragic,
Violet and sulphur-yellow was its hue,
It seemed to throb with love's mysterious magic.

Tradition says, when Christ was crucified