Iole

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Title:     Iole
Author: William Johnson Cory [More Titles by Cory]

I will not leave the smouldering pyre:
Enough remains to light again:
But who am I to dare desire
A place beside the king of men?

So burnt my dear Ochalian town;
And I an outcast gazed and groaned.
But, when my father's roof fell down,
For all that wrong sweet love atoned.

He led me trembling to the ship,
He seemed at least to love me then;
He soothed, he clasped me lip to lip:
How strange, to wed the king of men.

I linger, orphan, widow, slave,
I lived when sire and brethren died;
Oh, had I shared my mother's grave, .
Or clomb unto the hero's side!

That comrade old hath made his moan;
The centaur cowers within his den:
And I abide to guard alone
The ashes of the king of men.

Alone, beneath the night divine--
Alone, another weeps elsewhere:
Her love for him is unlike mine,
Her wail she will not let me share.

[The end]
William Johnson Cory's poem: Iole

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