Strange is the song, and the soul that is singing Falters because of the vision it sees;Voice that is not of the living is ringing Down in the depths where the darkness is clinging, Even when Noon is the lord of the leas, Fast, like a curse, to the ghosts of the trees!
Here in a mist that is parted in sunder, Half with the darkness and half with the day;Face of a woman, but face of a wonder, Vivid and wild as a flame of the thunder, Flashes and fades, and the wail of the grey Water is loud on the straits of the bay!
Father, whose years have been many and weary -Elder, whose life is as lovely as light Shining in ways that are sterile and dreary -Tell me the name of this beautiful peri, Flashing on me like the wonderful white Star, at the meeting of morning and night.
``Look to thy Saviour, and down on thy knee, man, Lean on the Lord, as the Zebedee leaned;Daughter of hell is the neighbour of thee, man -Lilith, of Adam the luminous leman!
Turn to the Christ to be succoured and screened, Saved from the eyes of a marvellous fiend!
``Serpent she is in the shape of a woman, Brighter than woman, ineffably fair!
Shelter thyself from the splendour, and sue, man;Light that was never a loveliness human Lives in the face of this sinister snare, Longing to strangle thy soul with her hair!
``Lilith, who came to the father and bound him Fast with her eyes in the first of the springs;Lilith she is, but remember she drowned him, Shedding her flood of gold tresses around him -Lulled him to sleep with the lyric she sings:
Melody strange with unspeakable things!
``Low is her voice, but beware of it ever, Swift bitter death is the fruit of delay;Never was song of its beauty - ah! never -Heard on the mountain, or meadow, or river, Not of the night is it, not of the day -Fly from it, stranger, away and away.''
Back on the hills are the blossom and feather, Glory of noon is on valley and spire;Here is the grace of magnificent weather, Where is the woman from gulfs of the nether?
Where is the fiend with the face of desire?
Gone, with a cry, in miraculous fire!
Sound that was not of this world, or the spacious Splendid blue heaven, has passed from the lea;Dead is the voice of the devil audacious:
Only a dream is her music fallacious, Here, in the song and the shadow of tree, Down by the green and the gold of the sea.
