The chimes called midnight, just at interlune, <br />And the daytime talk on the Roman investigations <br />Was checked by silence, save for the husky tune <br />The bubbling waters played near the excavations. <br /> <br /> <br />And a warm air came up from underground, <br />And a flutter, as of a filmy shape unsepulchred, <br />That collected itself, and waited, and looked around: <br />Nothing was seen, but utterances could be heard: <br /> <br /> <br />Those of the goddess whose shrine was beneath the pile <br />Of the God with the baldachined altar overhead: <br />'And what did you get by raising this nave and aisle <br />Close on the site of the temple I tenanted? <br /> <br /> <br />'The notes of your organ have thrilled down out of view <br />To the earth-clogged wrecks of my edifice many a year, <br />Though stately and shining once - ay, long ere you <br />Had set up crucifix and candle here. <br /> <br /> <br />'Your priests have trampled the dust of mine without rueing, <br />Despising the joys of man whom I so much loved, <br />Though my springs boil on by your Gothic arcades and pewing, <br />And sculptures crude…. Would Jove they could be removed!' <br /> <br /> <br />' - Repress, O lady proud, your traditional ires; <br />You know not by what a frail thread we equally hang; <br />It is said we are images both - twitched by peoples desires; <br />And that I, as you, fail as a song that men time agone sang!' . . . . . . . <br /> <br />And the olden dark hid the cavities late laid bare, <br />And all was suspended and soundless as before, <br />Except for a gossamery noise fading off in the air, <br />And the boiling voice of the waters' medicinal pour.<br /><br />Thomas Hardy<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/aquae-sulis/
