Chapter V

You were a maiden like a dream
Who led me where volcanic dust
Rained in a scoriac mountain stream,
Where, from Andean snows, was thrust
One crater belching stones and steam.

You were an Inca princess when
I was a cavalier of Spain,
Who frowned among Pizarro's men,
And saw the New World rent with pain.--
No grace of God could save me then.

And it was you who led me far
To gaze on caves of Inca gold:
But when we came, lo! warrior
On warrior, an army rolled
Around us panoplied for war.

Fierce faces chiseled out of stone
Are not more stern.--Down, underneath,
I heard the sullen earthquake groan;
Above me, red eruptions seeth.
And clenched my teeth and stood alone.

And then you pled and was denied.--
They laid me where the lava crawled,
Red-rivered, down the mountain side.
I felt the slow, slow hell-heat scald:
And as it closed, you leapt and died.