# Records of Woman: with Other Poems/The Mourner for the Barmecides

THE MOURNER FOR THE BARMECIDES.
O good old man! how well in thee appears The constant service of the antique world! Thou art not for the fashion of these times. As You Like It.
Fallen was the House of Giafar; and its name, The high romantic name of Barmecide, A sound forbidden on its own bright shores, By the swift Tygris' wave. Stern Haroun's wrath, Sweeping the mighty with their fame away, Had so pass'd sentence: but man's chainless heart Hides that within its depths, which never yet Th' oppressor's thought could reach.
'Twas desolate Where Giafar's halls, beneath the burning sun, Spread out in ruin lay. The songs had ceas'd; The lights, the perfumes, and the genii-tales, Had ceas'd; the guests were gone. Yet still one voice Was there—the fountain's; thro' those eastern courts, Over the broken marble and the grass, Its low clear music shedding mournfully.
And still another voice!—an aged man, Yet with a dark and fervent eye beneath His silvery hair, came, day by day, and sate On a white column's fragment; and drew forth, From the forsaken walls and dim arcades, A tone mat shook them with its answering thrill To his deep accents. Many a glorious tale He told that sad yet stately solitude, Pouring his memory's fulness o'er its gloom, Like waters in the waste; and calling up,
By song or high recital of their deeds, Bright solemn shadows of its vanish'd race To people their own halls: with these alone, In all this rich and breathing world, his thoughts Held still unbroken converse. He had been Rear'd in this lordly dwelling, and was now The ivy of its ruins; unto which His fading life seem'd bound. Day roll'd on day, And from that scene the loneliness was fled; For crowds around the grey-hair'd chronicler Met as men meet, within whose anxious hearts Fear with deep feeling strives; till, as a breeze Wanders thro' forest-branches, and is met By one quick sound and shiver of the leaves, The spirit of his passionate lament, As thro' their stricken souls it pass'd, awoke One echoing murmur.—But this might not be Under a despot's rule, and summon'd thence, The dreamer stood before the Caliph's throne: Sentenced to death he stood, and deeply pale,
And with his white lips rigidly compress'd; Till, in submissive tones, he ask'd to speak Once more, ere thrust from earth's fair sunshine forth. Was it to sue for grace?—his burning heart Sprang, with a sudden lightning, to his eye, And he was changed!—and thus, in rapid words, Th' o'ermastering thoughts, more strong than death found way.
"And shall I not rejoice to go, when the noble and the brave, With the glory on their brows, are gone before me to the grave? What is there left to look on now, what brightness in the land?— I hold in scorn the faded world, that wants their princely band!
"My chiefs! my chiefs! the old man comes, that in your halls was nurs'd, That follow'd you to many a fight, where flash'd your sabres first; That bore your children in his arms, your name upon his heart— Oh! must the music of that name with him from earth depart?
"It shall not be!—a thousand tongues, tho' human voice were still, With that high sound the living air triumphantly shall fill; The wind's free flight shall bear it on, as wandering seeds are sown, And the starry midnight whisper it, with a deep and thrilling tone.
"For it is not as a flower whose scent with the dropping leaves expires, And it is not as a household lamp, that a breath should quench its fires; It is written on our battle-fields with the writing of the sword, It hath left upon our desert-sands a light in blessings pour'd.
"The founts, the many gushing founts, which to the wild ye gave, Of you, my chiefs, shall sing aloud, as they pour a joyous wave; And the groves, with whose deep lovely gloom ye hung the pilgrim's way, Shall send from all their sighing leaves your praises on the day.
"The very walls your bounty rear'd, for the stranger’s homeless head, Shall find a murmur to record your tale, my glorious dead! Tho' the grass be where ye feasted once, where lute and cittern rung, And the serpent in your palaces lie coil'd amidst its young.
"It is enough! mine eye no more of joy or splendour sees, I leave your name in lofty faith, to the skies and to the breeze! I go, since earth her flower hath lost, to join the bright and fair, And call the grave a kingly house, for ye, my chiefs, are there!"
But while the old man sang, a mist of tears O'er Haroun's eyes had gathered, and a thought— Oh! many a sudden and remorseful thought Of his youth's once-lov'd friends, the martyr'd race O'erflowed his softening heart.—"Live, live!" he cried, "Thou faithful unto death! live on, and still Speak of thy lords; they were a princely band!"