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LO! the Wild Cow of the Desert, her yeanling estrayed from her— Lost in the wind plaited sand-dunes—athirst in the maze of them. Hot foot she follows those foot-prints—the thrice tangled ways of them. Her soul is shut save to one thing—the love-quest consuming her. Fearless she lows past the camp, men’s fires affright her not. Ranges she close to the tethered ones—the mares by the lances held. Noses she softly apart the veil in the women’s tent. Next—withdrawn under moonlight, a shadow afar off— Fades. Ere men cry, ‘Hold her fast!’ darkness recovers her. She the love-crazed and forlorn, when the dogs threaten her Only a side-tossed horn, as though a fly troubled her, Shows she hath heard, till a lance in the heart of her quivereth. —Lo, from that carcass aheap—where speeds the soul of it? Where is the tryst it must keep? Who is her pandar? Death!
Men I dismiss to the Mercy greet me not willingly;
Yet, among women a thousand, one comes to me mistress-wise. |