Le Repos in Egypte: The Sphinx
All day I watch the stretch of burning sand;
All night I brood beneath the golden stars;
Amid the silence of a desolate land,
No touch of bitterness my reverie mars.
Built by the proudest of a kingly line,
Over my head the centuries fly fast;
The secrets of the mighty dead are mine;
I hold the key of a forgotten past.
Yet, ever hushed into a rapturous dream,
I see again that night. A halo mild
Shone from the liquid moon. Beneath her beam
Traveled a tired young Mother and the Child.
Within mine arms she slumbered, and alone
I watched the Infant. At my feet her guide
Lay stretched o’er-wearied. On my breast of stone
Rested the Crucified.