Last night I slept beside the languorous Nile,
And saw swart Cleopatra, proud and large,
Drift slowly past me in her sumptuous barge.
Her crimson lips curved in a wanton smile,
Half-closed, her eyes flamed tenderness, the while
She dreamed of Antony. Her round, bare arms
Were clasped with jewels and Egyptian charms;
And her dark maids―the slow hours to beguile―
Perfumed her brow, and wove her glorious hair
In serpent coils. Pink lotus blossoms slept
On her warm breast; unevenly her breath
Came, fragrant, from her parted lips,―and ne’er
Throbbed throat so sweet. . . . And all unnoticed crept
Beside her, waiting, the dark reptile Death.
“A Dream of Cleopatra” as it appears in Higginson’s When the Birds Go North Again (1898).