For the storm trapped him ere he left the town Loaded with our week’s victuals: the slime clung And licked and clawed and chewed the clogged dragging wheels Till they sunk right to the axle: Saul, sodden and vexed, Like fury smote the mules’ mouths, pulling but sweat From his drowned hair and theirs, while the thunder knocked And all the air yawned water, falling water, And the light cart was water, like a wrecked raft, And all seemed like a forest under the ocean. Sudden the lightning flashed upon a figure Moving as a man moves in the slipping mud, Singing, but not as a man sings, through the storm, Which could not drown his sounds. Saul bawled “Hi! Hi!” And the man loomed, naked, vast, and gripped the wheels; Saul fiercely dug from under; he tugged the wheels; The mules foamed straining, straining. Suddenly they went. Saul and the man leaped in: Saul, miserably sodden, Marvelled at the large cheer in a naked glistening man; Yet soon fell in with that contented mood, That when our hut’s light broke on his new mind He could not credit it—too soon it seemed: The stranger man’s talk was witchery. I pray his baking be as magical; The cakes should be nigh burnt. [_She calls the_ NUBIAN. _He answers from within._] NUBIAN They are laid by to cool, housewife. LILITH Bring me the sherbet from the ledge and the fast-dried figs. [_The_ NUBIAN _brings sherbet, figs, and a bowl of ice, and lays them down_.] [_She looks curiously at him. He is an immense man with squat, mule-skinned features: his jet-black curled beard, crisp hair, glistening nude limbs, appear to her like some heathen idol of ancient stories._] [_She thinks to herself._] Out of the lightning In a dizzying cloven wink This apparition stood up, Of stricken trunk or beast’s spirit, Stirred by Saul’s blasphemies; So Saul’s heart feared, aghast. But lo, he touched the mischance and life ran straight! Was it the storm-spirit, storm’s pilot, With all the heaving débris of Noah’s sunken days Dragged on his loins; Law’s spirit wandering to us Through Nature’s anarchy, Wandering towards us when the Titans yet were young? Perhaps Moses and Buddha he met. [_She speaks aloud._] The shadow of these pomegranate boughs Is sweet and restful; sit and ease your feet. Eat of these figs; You have journeyed long. NUBIAN All my life, housewife. LILITH You have seen men and women, Soaked yourself in powers and old glories, In broken days and tears and glees, And touched cold hands— Hands shut in pitiless trances where the feast high. I think there is more sorrow in the world Than man can bear. NUBIAN None can exceed their limit, lady: You either bear or break. LILITH