As goodly household vessel, nor for that Far finer thing which I had hoped to be.... Death, holding high his retrospective lamp, Shows me those first, far years of wedded life, Ere I had learnt to grasp the barren shape Of what the Fates had destined for my life Then, as all youthful spirits are, was I Wholly incredulous that Nature meant So little, who had promised me so much. At first I fought my fate with gentle words, With high endeavours after greater things; Striving to win the soul of Sokrates, Like some slight bird, who sings her burning love To human master, till at length she finds Her tender language wholly misconceived, And that same hand whose kind caress she sought, With fingers flippant flings the careless corn.... I do remember how, one summer’s eve, He, seated in an arbour’s leafy shade, Had bade me bring fresh wine-skins.... As I stood Ling’ring upon the threshold, half concealed By tender foliage, and my spirit light With draughts of sunny weather, did I mark An instant the gay group before mine eyes. Deepest in shade, and facing where I stood, Sat Plato, with his calm face and low brows Which met above the narrow Grecian eyes, The pale, thin lips just parted to the smile, Which dimpled that smooth olive of his cheek. His head a little bent, sat Sokrates, With one swart finger raised admonishing, And on the air were borne his changing tones. Low lounging at his feet, one fair arm thrown Around his knee (the other, high in air Brandish’d a brazen amphor, which yet rained Bright drops of ruby on the golden locks And temples with their fillets of the vine), Lay Alkibiades the beautiful. And thus, with solemn tone, spake Sokrates: “This fair Aspasia, which our Perikles Hath brought from realms afar, and set on high In our Athenian city, hath a mind, I doubt not, of a strength beyond her race; And makes employ of it, beyond the way Of women nobly gifted: woman’s frail-- Her body rarely stands the test of soul; She grows intoxicate with knowledge; throws The laws of custom, order,’neath her feet, Feasting at life’s great banquet with wide throat.” Then sudden, stepping from my leafy screen, Holding the swelling wine-skin o’er my head, With breast that heaved, and eyes and cheeks aflame, Lit by a fury and a thought, I spake: “By all great powers around us! can it be That we poor women are empirical? That gods who fashioned us did strive to make Beings too fine, too subtly delicate, With sense that thrilled response to ev’ry touch Of nature’s, and their task is not complete? That they have sent their half-completed work To bleed and quiver here upon the earth? To bleed and quiver, and to weep and weep, To beat its soul against the marble walls