I sit beneath my fig-tree, while my kine
Pasture around me drowsily, knee-deep
In lilies, chewing sweetest cud of sleep,
While I sing softly to this wheel of mine.
A skein of many-coloured threads I twine
And know not why, or why indeed I sing
Low, as the bees do in their wandering
From lotus unto lotus round my shrine.
My light is only sunset's: it burns low
And lower yet these seasons till I dread
The darkness creeping on me from the skies.
I loved the full fair nights of long ago
When Sphinx and Sekhet worked their mysteries!
Then I rocked Horus: now I rock the dead.