Variations: X

Queen cleopatra, now grown old, Watched the green grass turning brown ... The river is shrunk to half its size: Now I will lay me down. Queen Cleopatra called her slaves And peered in the mirror with age-pearled eyes; My lips are not so read as they were: Not so the old leaf dies! Light the torches, and fill the courts With scarlet music, and bring to me Vermilion to smear upon my lips, And opals, that I may be Once more what Cleopatra was Before the woman became the queen ... She laughed, and backward tossed her head; And horn, and tambourine, Snarled at the hot and red-starred night, While gasping dancers, one by one, Whirled on the stone with yellow feet ... And when that dance was done She poured cold poison into a cup And watched the thick foam wink and seethe: One black bubble upon her tongue And she would cease to breathe. She held the poison before her mouth ... And saw the dark tomb hewed in stone Where a thousand nights would drift as one, And she would sleep alone; And lightly touched the goblet's rim, And thought, with a pleased and narrowed eye, Of this and that, and Antony, And the laugh that will not die.