If thou, like some great elephant of the sky,
  Shouldst wish from heaven’s eminence to bend
    And taste the crystal stream, her beauties high—­
  As thy dark shadows with her whiteness blend—­
  Would be what Jumna’s waters at Prayaga lend.

  LII

The magnificent Himalaya range.

    Her birth-place is Himalaya’s rocky crest
  Whereon the scent of musk is never lost,
    For deer rest ever there where thou wilt rest
  Sombre against the peak with whiteness glossed,
  Like dark earth by the snow-white bull of Shiva tossed.

  LIII

    If, born from friction of the deodars,
  A scudding fire should prove the mountain’s bane,
    Singeing the tails of yaks with fiery stars,
  Quench thou the flame with countless streams of rain—­
  The great have power that they may soothe distress and pain.

  LIV

    If mountain monsters should assail thy path
  With angry leaps that of their object fail,
    Only to hurt themselves in helpless wrath,
  Scatter the creatures with thy pelting hail—­
  For who is not despised that strives without avail?

  LV

    Bend lowly down and move in reverent state
  Round Shiva’s foot-print on the rocky plate
    With offerings laden by the saintly great;
  The sight means heaven as their eternal fate
  When death and sin are past, for them that faithful wait.

  LVI

    The breeze is piping on the bamboo-tree;
  And choirs of heaven sing in union sweet
    O’er demon foe of Shiva’s victory;
  If thunders in the caverns drumlike beat,
  Then surely Shiva’s symphony will be complete.

  LVII

The mountain pass called the Swan-gate.

    Pass by the wonders of the snowy slope;
  Through the Swan-gate, through mountain masses rent
    To make his fame a path by Bhrigu’s hope
  In long, dark beauty fly, still northward bent,
  Like Vishnu’s foot, when he sought the demon’s chastisement.

  LVIII

And at Mount Kailasa, the long journey is ended;

    Seek then Kailasa’s hospitable care,
  With peaks by magic arms asunder riven,
    To whom, as mirror, goddesses repair,
  So lotus-bright his summits cloud the heaven,
  Like form and substance to God’s daily laughter given.

  LIX

    Like powder black and soft I seem to see
  Thine outline on the mountain slope as bright
    As new-sawn tusks of stainless ivory;
  No eye could wink before as fair a sight
  As dark-blue robes upon the Ploughman’s shoulder white.

  LX

    Should Shiva throw his serpent-ring aside
  And give Gauri his hand, go thou before
    Upon the mount of joy to be their guide;
  Conceal within thee all thy watery store
  And seem a terraced stairway to the jewelled floor.