Arabesque.

On a background of pale gold     I would trace with quaint design,         Penciled fine,     Brilliant-colored, Moorish scenes,     Mosques and crescents, pages, queens,         Line on line,     That the prose-world of to-day     Might the gorgeous Past's array         Once behold.     On the magic painted shield     Rich Granada's Vega green         Should be seen;     Crystal fountains, coolness flinging,     Hanging gardens' skyward springing         Emerald sheen;     Ruddy when the daylight falls,     Crowned Alhambra's beetling walls         Stand revealed;     Balconies that overbrow     Field and city, vale and stream.         In a dream     Lulled the drowsy landscape basks;         Mark the gleam     Silvery of each white-swathed peak!     Mountain-airs caress the cheek,         Fresh from the snow.     Here in Lindaraxa's bower     The immortal roses bloom;         In the room     Lion-guarded, marble-paven,     Still the fountain leaps to heaven.         But the doom     Of the banned and stricken race     Overshadows every place,         Every hour.     Where fair Lindaraxa dwelt     Flits the bat on velvet wings;         Mute the strings     Of the broken mandoline;     The Pavilion of the Queen         Widely flings     Vacant windows to the night;     Moonbeams kiss the floor with light         Where she knelt.     Through these halls that people stepped     Who through darkling centuries         Held the keys     Of all wisdom, truth, and art,     In a Paradise apart,          Lapped in ease,     Sagely pondering deathless themes,     While, befooled with monkish dreams,         Europe slept.     Where shall they be found today?     Yonder hill that frets the sky         "The last Sigh     Of the Moor" is named still.     There the ill-starred Boabdil         Bade good-by     To Granada and to Spain,     Where the Crescent ne'er again         Holdeth sway.     Vanished like the wind that blows,     Whither shall we seek their trace         On earth's face?     The gigantic wheel of fate,     Crushing all things soon or late,          Now a race,     Now a single life o'erruns,     Now a universe of suns,         Now a rose.