The Muse of Atlantis
by Clark Ashton Smith
Will you not join me in Atlantis, where we will go down
through streets of blue and yellow marble to the wharves
of orichalch, and choose us a galley with a golden Eros for
figure-head, and sails of Tyrian sendal? With mariners that
knew Odysseus, and beautiful amber-breasted slaves from
the mountain-vales of Lemuria, we will lift anchor for the
unknown fortunate isles of the outer sea; and, sailing in the
wake of an opal sunset, will lose that ancient land in the
glaucous twilight, and see from our couch of ivory and satin
the rising of unknown stars and perished planets. Perhaps
we will not return, but will follow the tropic summer from
isle to halcyon isle, across the amaranthine seas of myth and
fable; we will eat the lotus, and the fruit of lands whereof
Odysseus never dreamt; and drink the pallid wines of faery,
grown in a vale of perpetual moonlight. I will find for you a
necklace of rosy-tinted pearls, and a necklace of yellow rubies,
and crown you with precious corals that have the semblance,
of sanguine-coloured blossoms. We will roam in the marts of
forgotten cities of jasper, and carnelian-builded ports beyond
Cathay; and I will buy you a gown of peacock azure damascened
with copper and gold and vermilion; and a gown of black samite
with runes of orange, woven by fantastic sorcery without the
touch of hands, in a dim land of spells and philtres.
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