<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=429739" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Marco Polo</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">READING how Marco Polo came <br>By bridle-path to Kanbalu, <br>Forgotten fibres wake to flame, <br>And smoke old memories anew . . . . <br>For in a bygone life of mine <br>I watched the carven rampart shine, <br>Where Kublai's five-clawed dragons glowed <br>Like painted wyverns, line on line. <br>And past those plaster dragon-heads, <br>Those frescoes cut with curious flowers, <br>In verdigris and lilac-reds <br>Old tiles gleamed on the crusted towers, <br>While bridges cleft of serpent-stone <br>Bowed by their side, like branches blown <br>From some high granite Tree of Life <br>Whose roots were coiled round Kublai's throne. <br>O myrtles on the Jasper Mount, <br>O forest-towered elephants, <br>And fire-fish in the topaz fount <br>With red fins blown like water-plants, <br>And green cornelian tortoise-rows <br>Below the aqueduct, and those <br>Gold-feathered cranes, I saw them all, <br>How many ages gone, who knows? <br>I saw tall gilded Tartars pass <br>Behind their marble balustrades, <br>With maces made of beaten brass <br>And turquoise-hafted sabre-blades. <br>I heard the little golden bells <br>Blow faintly down the citadels, <br>And spied those ivory courts within <br>Through windows of transparent shells. <br>But past the fountain-pools I peered, <br>Beyond the birds, to that divan, <br>Where, fingering his tawny beard, <br>In silence dreamed the splendid Khan. <br>Green china bowls of wine were there, <br>And oranges and milk-of-mare, <br>While, stamping on his jewelled wrist, <br>A falcon climbed with eyes aflare. <br>He's gone; and with him, flowers and birds, <br>And old Venetians too, have died; <br>Yet burnt in Marco Polo's words, <br>Those unforgotten splendours hide . . . <br>And, tired of life's new-fashioned plan, <br>I long to be barbarian. <br>I'm sick of modern men, I wish <br>You were still living, Kublai-Khan!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Kenneth+Slessor">Kenneth Slessor</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=429739" data-title="Marco Polo de Kenneth Slessor" data-description="READING how Marco Polo came By bridle-path to Kanbalu, Forgotten fibres wake to flame, And smoke old memories anew . . . . For in a bygone life of mine I watched the carven rampart shine, Where Kublai's five-clawed dragons glowed Like paint..."></div> </div> </div>

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