Eurydice

by Algernon Charles Swinburne

TO VICTOR HUGO

Orpheus, the night is full of tears and cries,
  And hardly for the storm and ruin shed
  Can even thine eyes be certain of her head
Who never passed out of thy spirit's eyes,
But stood and shone before them in such wise
  As when with love her lips and hands were fed,
  And with mute mouth out of the dusty dead
Strove to make answer when thou bad'st her rise.

Yet viper-stricken must her lifeblood feel
  The fang that stung her sleeping, the foul germ
  Even when she wakes of hell's most poisonous worm,
Though now it writhe beneath her wounded heel.
  Turn yet, she will not fade nor fly from thee;
  Wait, and see hell yield up Eurydice.


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