Five Men and Pompey: A Series of Dramatic Portraits

Five Men and Pompey: A Series of Dramatic Portraits

Title: Five Men and Pompey Subtitle: A Series of Dramatic Portraits Author: Stephen Vincent Bent Release Date: June 26, 2020 [EBook #62494] Language: English Credits: Produced by Tim Lindell, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) Twelve years! Twelve years of striving! and at last My power issecure? Still Pompey lives And has an army and Metellus strives To wipe out his defeats. The net is cast: Cast, and draws ever tighter: and my men Grumble and mutter, near to mutiny. Perpenna stirs up treason: like a fen Of black and quaking marshes, my own camp Boils up all foulness, gapes to swallow me. The black death-chariot waits, the coursers stamp Yet I have made a law, have curbed the tribes, Built up a senate, founded schools, withstood For twelve long years the iron arm of Rome. I have not spared my time, my gold, my blood. And now all vanishes in plots and gibes I love this warm, brown land; it is my home. And yetto see the Forum once again! Ah, Nydia! Nydia! Had you not died I could have crossed the Alps, have crushed these men, These unclean vultures, tearing at Romes side; I could have brought back the Republicthen. You died. I still fight on, but I am old. Pompey is young, and though I beat him now, He will be victor, as the end will show.[10] Ah, Plancus, enter! Is the night so cold That you need shroud yourself in that great cloak? You too, Perpenna, Cimon, you who broke So bravely through the foe, you fear a draught? Be seated, friends! My comrades, we have laughed And feasted for an hour together, yet I have not told you why I summoned thus My ten most trusted leaders to this feast. Now is the time! I shall discharge the debt. Glorious tidings come from out the East! And Mithridates hurries aid to us Let not that goblet fall I pray thee, friend! Ah! Dog and traitor! So this was your end! Guards! Guards!I think you will not rise again, Perpenna, from that blow! Guards! Ho there, men! A-a-ah! Thank you, Pompey! No, you will not take Me back to grace your triumph: they have done Their work too well, your friends. My sands are run. And you have burst all barriers left to break That shielded the Republic. It is dead. Not with a pomp of banners, Not with a flare of spears, Not with mourning or head downcast The great Republic dies at last; A sword in the heart and the hands bound fast, Dead in the wreck of the years! [11] Pompey, Pompey, chief of pride, Hero and lord of Rome! You ride to a gallant triumph now, Gay as the green and fruitful bough; But the bough will be withered and dry enow When you ride for the last time home! Pompey, Pompey, laugh while you may! Laugh as Polycrates laughed! But ever, when life is most glorious, I bid you think of Sertorius, Of how he rode forth victorious, And how he was slain by craft. I have been slain by great lords; But a slave shall strike you down, A slave shall strike you down from behind, And your strength shall fail, and your sight go blind, And your body a nameless grave shall find, You, that strove for a crown! Pompey, Pompey, turn where you may! You shall get but little ease. For whether on sea or whether on land, One picture shall ever before you stand A man struck down on a barren strand A head hacked off by the seas! Pompey, Pompey, go where you will, Double and turn again! One thought shall you know till you lie in your grave;[12] A thought not even your soul can brave! The thought of a mean and evil slave, And a knife that was forged in Spain! So the Republic dies! and all my work Is vain; the things I built are shattered now, My task is done, the task I dared not shirk; And I am very tired. Nydia, come! Come as you came that day down the green walk, The day I rode in triumph back to Rome, After the Cimbri had been crushedand talk, Talk as we talked that day beside the pool, Shadowed by ilex, where the golden hearts Of lilies burned within the water cool, Nydia! But she stays not, she departs! The marble seatyou lifted up your face I have fought long now. I am weary. Come! Nydia! Nydia! and lead me home! Home! How the Forum blazes in the sun! The Roman faces and the kindly speech; The melon-sellers, proffering to each That comes, ripe, green-streaked melonsWhat! you shun An old friend, Balbus? No! It was not I! No! by the gods! I never gave consent To those red days of massacre!They cry! Oh gods! they cry, cry, they are not yet dead! They will not die: they hurl upon my head Curses and prayers! I hear them in my tent! They are not dead! Oh gods! They are not dead! I never gave consent! [13] Still the time slips And Nydia comes not. I am very tired. The things are broken to which I aspired, And you alone are left. Love! She is here Nydia, Nydia.... ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 62494
Author: Benét, Stephen Vincent
Release Date: Jun 26, 2020
Format: eBook
Language: English