If a letter one should ask, it
Mounts by means of cord or basket, Saving postman flights of stairs
While he minds his own affairs.
Water-babies here abound, In canals retired found;
To a floating board they cling Tethered by the mother's string. Beggar, dirty, picturesque, so Lazy slumbering al fresco;
Though his last of coin is spent, he Feels the dolce far niente, Dreading water without doubt, Administered inside or out; He, as cicerone, tells
Horrors of the dungeon cells Underneath the Bridge of Sighs, Opening the tourists' eyes; Warbling as he points the scene Of the deadly guillotine,
Or the hole where Byron slept, And where better men have wept.
In the spacious council chamber I on mental ladder clamber, And with due historic halo Restore the face of Faliero; And when no spectator's by,
In the lion's jaw I shy
Denunciation to the State Of my landlord whom I hate. Or in dreams, if funds are low, I to the Rialto go,
Where good Shylock lends to me An old clo' security;
While he's sorting out the heap I at Jessica take a peep; Or at palace window high, As I lazily float by,
See the Desdemona blond, With pathetic glances fond, Waving 'kerchief to the Moor As he slams the great front door.
Though no more thy ship of state, With doges on her decks who wait, Rules the sea with wedding-ring And maidens orange garlands bring; Though the Lion of Saint Mark, Cracked and weather-stained and dark, From his column has descended,
His despotic sway long ended,
Teeth well filed and claws close grated,
Roar, like Bottom's, mitigated,
Tucked by keepers in museum,
Can't be seen unless we fee 'em;
Fortune, tiptoe on the world,
Let my sails be ever furled
Near thy shrine; here let my eyes Gaze in ever new surprise;
While the breaker constant combs
View thy palaces and domes Which against the sunset sky Into sudden darkness die.
Fallen mistress of the sea, Let me cast my lot with thee! Far from earth, down in the sea, Venice, thou art the land for me!
ONLY to live, only to be In Venice, is enough for me. To be a beggar, and to lie At home beneath the equal sky,
To feel the sun, to drink the night, Had been enough for my delight; Happy because the sun allowed The luxury of being proud Not to some only; but to all The right to lie along the wall. Here my ambition dies; I ask
No more than some half-idle task, To be done idly, and to fill Some gaps of leisure when I will. I care not if the world forget That it was ever in my debt;
I care not where its prizes fall; I long for nothing, having all. The sun, each morning, on his way, Calls for me at the Zattere; I wake and greet him, I go out, Meet him, and follow him about; We spend the day together, he Goes to bed early; as for me,
I make the moon my mistress, prove Constant to my inconstant love. For she is coy with me, will hie To my arms amorously, and fly Ere I have kissed her; ah! but she, She it is, to eternity,
I adore only; and her smile Bewilders the enchanted isle To more celestial magic, glows At once the crystal and the rose. The crazy lover of the moon, I hold her, on the still lagoon, Sometimes I hold her in my arms; "Tis her cold silver kiss that warms My blood to singing, and puts fire Into the heart of my desire.
And all desire in Venice dies
To such diviner lunacies;
Life dreams itself; the world goes on, Oblivious, in oblivion;
Life dreams itself, content to keep
Happy immortally, in sleep.
THE masts rise white to the stars, White on the night of the sky,
Out of the water's night,
And the stars lean down to them white.
Ah! how the stars seem nigh;
How far away are the stars!
And I, too, under the stars, Alone with the night again, And the water's monotone; I and the night alone,
And the world and the ways
Farther from me than the stars.
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