Though from red ramparts I can see the city swarm
With press of life, look on the swinging caravans
Of camels come from Gwalior beneath the moon,
Hear all the glinting hum of things that take
The curious fancy, can they ever wake
Those slumbering tunes with all their wealth of jewelled fans?
And shall I hear again the swaying orchestras—
Those rhythmic cohorts—and low passionate songs sung
For Sorrow; the tense preluding of operas
So rare and fraught; canorous harmony
Of bourdons; airs my mother played to me
And sweet old fiddled strains I knew when I was young?...
And from carven doors and lattices, and throng
Of narrow ways that lace the long bazaar's mosaic
Of human hearts and painted curious walls, the song
Of evening, all the city's tintamar
Springs up like sandalwood or cinnabar,
A drench of heavy-scented noises, mixed to slake
My thirst for music. Yet right dead I am to all,
Dram-wrapped in unsung harmonies that seem to climb
With cool, slow, rippling strength towards a god's grey hall
Through wind-swept woods of tonal mysteries,
Up granite fugues...abysmal cadences.—
Ah, I have not heard music for so long a time!
