A Survival by Gordon Bottomley Lyrics

Rare Lionardo's fair dead Florentine
Still mid her faery rocks doth darkly smile
The ages down, whilst many an ancient wile
Lights up her eyes, like sunlight in old wine.
She glows in that faint land of strange design
Sole-set, like some ensorcelled languid isle
In evil fairness mid a sea of guile,
With pitiless features calmed to seem benign.
One smiles on me in stillness yesterday
As Lisa smiles upon me from the past,
Until this later world seemed spent and grey.
"Ah, lady," whispered I, "didst ever taste
Thy painter's lips? What love-words did he say?
Know'st though no songs of thine encomiast?"