The Soul Of Lilith

I

ON her rose-couch, never roused,

     Lay the cold, white form of Lilith,

And her voice came, hushed and drowsy, 

     Like a tiny stream that trilleth

          From its fountain

          In the mountain,

Where the eternal twilight dwelleth.

II

" I pierced aloft the shadowy vault of night,

     And Lo,  a city tall, with slender towers

And upward-clustering pinnacles, snow white,

     Halls flanked with glittering marble steps, and bowers

To which the lithe vine hung her purple fruit

     And breathed her odour   And the straying stars

Chimed, as they rolled, with music of the lute,

     Or like the mystic sounds of far-off wars

That faintly catch the ear. Far on the plain,

A river flashed by fields of golden grain,

And shimmered, kissed by sunlight ; then a throng

Of dancers, sweeping by with happy song."  

III

A shuddering sigh, half weariness, half fear, 

     Fluttered the lily-petals on her breast.

Again the murmur droned : " I feel you near,

     El Rami ; free me now, that I may rest

Far in the sunny realms where lie my dreams."

     But he in frenzy caught up Lilith's form,

White as the marble oriel, where the beams---

     The blood-red sunbeams---told of coming storm ;

And swore to sway her soul, come life come death.

But even as he raved, the sobbing breath

Was stilled and hushed ; the fitful lamp burned dim,

And through the silence throbbed a mournful hymn. 

IV

In her dream land, ever free,

     Flits the lonely soul of Lilith,

Sighing like the restless sea, 

     Moaning, moaning, as it swelleth, 

          Hurling waves

          Through the caves

Where the screaming sea-gull shrilleth.

Written by
Herbert Bennett



Herbert Bennett wrote this poem whilst still a pupil at Queen Mary's School. He later volunteered for sevice rising to the rank of Second-Lieutenant Royal Welsh Fusiliers. He was killed in France in April 1918.