Watchers of the Sky by Alfred Noyes
page 41 of 156 (26%)
page 41 of 156 (26%)
|
And build his house and his observatory."
So Tycho set this island where he lived Whispering with wizardry; and, in its heart, He lighted that strange lanthorn of the law, And built himself that wonder of the world, Uraniborg, a fortress for the truth, A city of the heavens. Around it ran A mighty rampart twenty-two feet high, And twenty feet in thickness at the base. Its angles pointed north, south, east and west, With gates and turrets; and, within this wall, Were fruitful orchards, apple, and cherry, and pear; And, sheltered in their midst from all but sun, A garden, warm and busy with singing bees. There, many an hour, his flaxen-haired Christine, Sang to her child, her first-born, Magdalen, Or watched her playing, a flower among the flowers. Dark in the centre of that zone of bliss Arose the magic towers of Tycho Brahe. Two of them had great windows in their roofs Opening upon the sky where'er he willed, And under these observatories he made A library of many a golden book; Poets and sages of old Greece and Rome, And many a mellow legend, many a dream Of dawning truth in Egypt, or the dusk Of Araby. Under all of these he made A subterranean crypt for alchemy, |
|