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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Last Banquet Of Antony And Cleopatra</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Thy foes had girt thee with their dead array,<br>O stately Alexandra! - yet the sound<br>Of mirth and music, at the close of day,<br>Swelled from thy splendid fabrics, far around<br>O'er camp and wave. Within the royal hall,<br>In gay magnificence the feast was spread;<br>And, brightly streaming from the pictured wall,<br>A thousand lamps their trembling lustre shed <br>O'er many a column, rich with precious dyes,<br>That tinge the marble's vein, 'neath Afric's burning skies.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">And soft and clear that wavering radiance played <br>O'er sculptured forms, that round the pillared scene<br>Calm and majestic rose, by art arrayed<br>In goldlike beauty, awfully serene.<br>Oh! how unlike the troubled guests reclined<br>Round that luxurious board! - in every face<br>Some shadow from the tempest of the mind<br>Rising by fits, the searching eye might trace,<br>Though vainly masked in smiles which are not mirth,<br>But the proud spirit's veil thrown o'er the woes of earth.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Their brows are bound with wreaths, whose transient bloom<br>May still survive the wearers - and the rose<br>Perchance may scarce be withered when the tomb<br>Receives the mighty to its dark repose!<br>The day must dawn on battle, and may set<br>In death - but fill the mantling wine-cup high!<br>Despair is fearless, and the Fates e'en yet<br>Lend her one hour for parting revelry.<br>They who the empire of the world possessed,<br>Would taste its joys again, ere all exchanged for rest.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Its joys! oh, mark yon proud triumvir's mien,<br>And read their annals on that brow of care;<br>'Midst pleasure's lotus-bowers his steps have been;<br>Earth's brightest pathway led him to despair.<br>Trust not the glace that fain would yet inspire<br>The buoyant energies of days gone by; <br>There is delusion in its meteor-fire,<br>And all within is shame, is agony!<br>Away! the tear in bitterness may flow, <br>But there are smiles which bear a stamp of deeper woe.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Thy cheek is sunk, and faded as thy fame, <br>O lost, devoted Roman! yet thy brow<br>To that ascendant and undying name,<br>Pleads with stern loftiness that right e'en now.<br>Thy glory is departed, but hath left <br>A lingering light around thee - in decay <br>Not less than kingly, though of all bereft,<br>Thou seem'st as empire had not passed away<br>Supreme in ruin! teaching hearts elate,<br>A deep, prophetic dread of still mysterious fate!</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">But thou, enchantress-queen! whose love hath made <br>His desolation - thou art by his side,<br>In all thy sovereignty of charms arrayed,<br>To meet the storm with still unconquered pride. <br>Imperial being! e'en though many a stain<br>Of error be upon thee, there is power<br>In thy commanding nature, which shall reign<br>O'er the stern genius of misfortune's hour; <br>And the dark beauty of thy troubled eye<br>E'en now is all illumed with wild sublimity.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Thine aspect, all impassioned, wears a light<br>Inspiring and inspired - thy cheek a dye,<br>Which rises not from joy, but yet is bright<br>With the deep glow of feverish energy.<br>Proud siren of the Nile! thy glance is fraught<br>With an immortal fire - in every beam<br>It darts, there kindles some heroic thought,<br>But wild and awful as a sibyl's dream; <br>For though with death hast communed, to attain<br>Dread knowledge of the pangs that ransom from the chain.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">And the stern courage by such musings lent, <br>Daughter of Afric! o'er thy beauty throws <br>The grandeur of a regal spirit, blent <br>With all the majesty of mighty woes; <br>While he, so fondly, fatally adored,<br>Thy fallen Roman, gazes on thee yet,<br>Till scarce the soul, that once exulting soared,<br>Can deem the day-star of its glory set;<br>Scarce his charmed heart believes that power can be<br>In sovereign fate, o'er him thus fondly loved by thee.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">But there is sadness in the eyes around,<br>Which marked that ruined leader, and survey <br>His changeful mien, whence oft the gloom profound<br>Strange triumph chases haughtily away.<br>'Fill the bright goblet, warrior guests!' he cries;<br>'Quaff, ere we part, the generous nectar deep!<br>Ere sunset gild once more the western skies,<br>Your chief in cold forgetfulness may sleep,<br>While sounds of revel float o'er shore and sea,<br>And the red bowl again is crowned - but not for me.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">'Yet weep not thus - the struggle is not o'er,<br>O victors of Philippi! many a field <br>Hath yielded palms to us; - one effort more, <br>By one stern conflict must our doom be sealed!<br>Forget not, Romans! o'er a subject world<br>How royally your eagle's wing hath spread,<br>Though, from his eyrie of dominion hurled,<br>Now bursts the tempest on his crested head!<br>Yet sovereign still, if banished from the sky,<br>The sun's indignant bird, he must not droop - but die.'</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">The feast is o'er. 'Tis night, the dead of night -<br>Unbroken stillness broods o'er earth and deep;<br>From Egypt's heaven of soft and starry light<br>The moon looks cloudless o'er a world of sleep.<br>For those who wait the morn's awakening beams,<br>The battle signal to decide their doom,<br>Have sunk to feverish rest and troubled dreams -<br>Rest that shall soon be calmer in the tomb,<br>Dreams, dark and ominous, but <br>there<br>to cease,<br>When sleep the lords of war in solitude and peace.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">Wake, slumberers, wake! Hark! heard ye not a sound<br>Of gathering tumult? - Near and nearer still<br>Its murmur swells. Above, below, around,<br>Bursts a strange chorus forth, confused and shrill.<br>Wake, Alexandria! through thy streets the tread <br>Of steps unseen is hurrying, and the note<br>Of pipe and lyre and trumpet, wild and dread,<br>Is heard upon the midnight air to float;<br>And voices, clamorous as in frenzied mirth,<br>Mingle their thousand tones, which are not of the earth.</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><a href="http://www.citatepedia.com/comments.php?id=391620" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none">These are no mortal sounds - their thrilling strain<br>Hath more mysterious power, and birth more high;<br>And the deep horror chilling every vein<br>Owns them of stern, terrific augury.<br>Beings of worlds unknown! ye pass away,<br>O ye invisible and awful throng!<br>Your echoing footsteps and resounding lay<br>To Caesar's camp exulting move along.<br>Thy gods forsake thee, Antony! the sky <br>By that dread sign reveals thy doom - 'Despair and die!'</a></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><a href="http://poems.citatepedia.com/">poem</a> by <strong><a rel="author" href="http://authors.citatepedia.com/by.php?a=Felicia+Dorothea+Hemans">Felicia Dorothea Hemans</a></strong></div>