She had sent away her maidens--their weeping vexed her ears--
Their pallid faces filled her with impatient pitying scorn;--
But she kept one time-worn woman, who long had outgrown fears,
The old brown nurse who held her son the day that he was born.
The mighty gods had failed her--the river-gods and the sun,
And the little gods of brass and stone--who stared but made no sign,
So she pled with them no longer, her prayers were said and done,
And now she neither bowed her head, or knelt at any shrine.
Her hair was blown upon the wind like wreathes of golden flame,
And the sea-blue of her eyes cast blue shadows on her face,
For she was not of Egypt--but unto the king she came
A captive--yet a princess--from a northern sea-bound place.
She watched the fiery wheel roll down behind the level land,
One small hand curled above her eyes, and one above her heart,
But when the ruby afterglow crept up and stained the sand
She turned and gazed toward Goshen, where Israel dwelt apart.
* * * * *
Nine plagues had wasted Egypt with their tortures grim and slow;
The earth was desolated, and scarred by hail and fire;
Still even yet her Lord refused to let his bondsmen go
To worship in the wilderness, the God of their desire.
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