When Caesar Fell

When Caesar fell, where yellow Tiber rolls
Its heavy waters muddy,
Life, that was ebbing from a hundred holes
In Caesar’s body,
Cried with a hundred voices to the common air,
The unimperial day,
“Gather me up, oh, pour me into the veins of even a gilder of hair!
Let me not vanish away!”

The teeth of Caesar at the ignoble word
Were ground together in pride;
No sound came from his lips: the world has heard
How Caesar died.
In the Roman dust the cry of Caesar’s blood
Was heard and heard without wonder
Only by the fly that swam in the red flood
Till his head went under.