Yolanda of Cyprus. Rice Cale Young
this beauty,
Dear as the wind wafts from undying shrines
Of mystery and myrrh!
I'd have the eloquence of quickened moons
Pouring upon the midnight magicly,
To say all I have yearned,
Now, with your head pillowed upon my breast!
Slow sullen speech, come to my soldier lips,
Rough with command, and impotent of softness!
Come to my lips! or fill so full my eyes
That the unutterable shall seem as sweet
To my Yolanda. But … how, how now? tears?
[Lifts her face.
Yolanda. Amaury —
Amaury. What have I done? Too pronely pressed
You to this coat of steel?
Yolanda. No, no.
Amaury. My words,
Or silence, then?
Yolanda. Amaury, no, but sweet,
Sweet as the roses of Damascus crusht,
Your silence is! and sweeter than the dream
Of April nightingale on Troados,
Or gushing by the springs of Chitria,
Your every word of love! Yet – yet – ah, fold me,
Within your arms oblivion and hold me,
Fast to your being press me, and there bless me
With breathèd power of your manhood's might.
Amaury!..
Amaury. This I cannot understand.
Yolanda (freeing herself). Nothing – a folly – groundless frailty.
Amaury. You've been again at some old tale of sorrow,
[Goes to the lectern.
Pining along the pages of a book —
This, telling of that Italy madonna
Whose days were sad – I have forgotten how.
Is it not so?
Yolanda. No, no. The tears of women
Come as the air and sighing of the night,
We know not whence or why.
Amaury. Often, perhaps.
I am not skilled to tell. But never these!
They are of trouble known.
Yolanda. Yet now forget them.
Amaury. It will not leave my heart that somehow – how
I cannot fathom – Camarin —
Yolanda (lightly, to stop him). No farther!
Amaury. That Camarin of Paphos is their cause. —
Tell me —
Yolanda. Yes, that I love thee!
Amaury. Tell me —
Yolanda. Love thee!
As sea the sky! and as the sky the wind!
And as the wind the forest! As the forest —
What does the forest love, Amaury? I
Can think of nothing!
Amaury. Tell me then you have
Never a moment of you yielded to him,
That never he has touched too long this hand —
Till evermore he must, even as I —
Nor once into your eyes too deep has gazed!
You falter? darken?
Yolanda. Would he ne'er had come
Into these halls! that it were beautiful,
Holy to hate him as the Lost can hate.
Amaury. But 'tis not?
Yolanda. God shall judge him.
Amaury. And not you?
Yolanda. Though he is weak, there is within him —
Amaury. That
Which women trust? and you?
[Berengere enters. He turns to her.
Mother?
Berengere. A runner,
A soldier of your troop within the forts
Has come with word.
Amaury (starting). Mother!
Berengere. It is ill news?
I've seen that battle-light in you before.
'Tis of the Saracens? you ride to-night
Into their peril?
Amaury. Come, the word, the word!
Berengere. Only this token.
Amaury. The spur? the spur? (Takes it.) They then
Are landing!
Yolanda. How, Amaury; tell your meaning!
Amaury. The galleys of the Saracens have found
Anchor and land to-night near Keryneia.
My troops are ready and await me —
So I must speed.
Yolanda (with strange terror). I pray you, do not go.
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