On thy bosom though many a kiss be, There are none such as knew it of old. Was it Alciphron once or Arisbe, Male ringlets or feminine gold, That thy lips met with under the statue, Whence a look shot out sharp after thieves From the eyes of the garden-god at you Across the fig-leaves? Then still, through dry seasons and moister, One god had a wreath to his shrine; Then love was the pearl of his oyster,[4] And Venus rose red out of wine. We have all done amiss, choosing rather Such loves as the wise gods disdain; Intercede for us thou with thy father, Our Lady of Pain. In spring he had crowns of his garden, Red corn in the heat of the year, Then hoary green olives that harden When the grape-blossom freezes with fear; And milk-budded myrtles with Venus And vine-leaves with Bacchus he trod; And ye said, "We have seen, he hath seen us, A visible God." What broke off the garlands that girt you? What sundered you spirit and clay? Weak sins yet alive are as virtue To the strength of the sins of that day. For dried is the blood of thy lover, Ipsithilla, contracted the vein; Cry aloud, "Will he rise and recover, Our Lady of Pain?" Cry aloud; for the old world is broken: Cry out; for the Phrygian is priest, And rears not the bountiful token And spreads not the fatherly feast. From the midmost of Ida, from shady Recesses that murmur at morn, They have brought and baptized her, Our Lady, A goddess new-born. And the chaplets of old are above us, And the oyster-bed teems out of reach; Old poets outsing and outlove us, And Catullus makes mouths at our speech. Who shall kiss, in thy father's own city, With such lips as he sang with, again? Intercede for us all of thy pity, Our Lady of Pain. Out of Dindymus heavily laden Her lions draw bound and unfed A mother, a mortal, a maiden, A queen over death and the dead. She is cold, and her habit is lowly, Her temple of branches and sods; Most fruitful and virginal, holy, A mother of gods. She hath wasted with fire thine high places, She hath hidden and marred and made sad The fair limbs of the Loves, the fair faces Of gods that were goodly and glad. She slays, and her hands are not bloody; She moves as a moon in the wane, White-robed, and thy raiment is ruddy, Our Lady of Pain. They shall pass and their places be taken, The gods and the priests that are pure. They shall pass, and shalt thou not be shaken? They shall perish, and shalt thou endure? Death laughs, breathing close and relentless In the nostrils and eyelids of lust, With a pinch in his fingers of scentless And delicate dust.