More proudly than the youth surveys
That pile which thro' the gloom behind,
Half lighted by the altar's fire,
Glimmers--his destined funeral pyre!
Heaped by his own, his comrades hands,
Of every wood of odorous breath.
There, by the Fire-God's shrine it stands,
Ready to fold in radiant death
The few still left of those who swore
To perish there when hope was o'er--
The few to whom that couch of flame,
Which rescues them from bonds and shame,
Is sweet and welcome as the bed
For their own infant Prophet spread,
When pitying Heaven to roses turned
The death-flames that beneath him burned![261]
With watchfulness the maid attends
His rapid glance where'er it bends--
Why shoot his eyes such awful beams?
What plans he now? what thinks or dreams?
Alas! why stands he musing here,
When every moment teems with fear?
"HAFED, my own beloved Lord,"
She kneeling cries--"first, last adored!
"If in that soul thou'st ever felt
"Half what thy lips impassioned swore,
"Here on my knees that never knelt
"To any but their God before,
"I pray thee, as thou lovest me, fly--
"Now, now--ere yet their blades are nigh.
"Oh haste--the bark that bore me hither
"Can waft us o'er yon darkening sea
"East--west--alas, I care not whither,
"So thou art safe, and I with thee!
"Go where we will, this hand in thine,
"Those eyes before me smiling thus,
"Thro' good and ill, thro' storm and shine,
"The world's a world of love for us!
"On some calm, blessed shore we'll dwell,
"Where 'tis no crime to love too well;
"Where thus to worship tenderly
"An erring child of light like thee
"Will not be sin--or if it be
"Where we may weep our faults away,
"Together kneeling, night and day,
"Thou, for _my_ sake, at ALLA'S shrine,
"And I--at _any_ God's, for thine!"
Wildly these passionate words she spoke--
Then hung her head and wept for shame;
Sobbing as if a heart-string broke
With every deep-heaved sob that came,
While he, young, warm--oh! wonder not
If, for a moment, pride and fame;
His oath--his cause--that shrine of flame,
And IRAN'S self are all forgot
For her, whom at his feet he sees
Kneeling in speechless agonies.
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