I Would that I Were

I would that I were in India Land—
The India of my dreams,
With pearls for gravel and rubies for sand,
And palaces which at the turn of a hand
Should bloom by her sacred streams.

I would that my house were of smooth bamboo
In the shade of a palm-tree grove,
Where the cooling breath of the west-wind blew,
And the choir of the jungle would chant anew
Of hunting, of strife and love.

A girl as brown as mahogany
With silk upon bosom and hips
Would sit half bent in the palm-grove's lee—
I'd lay my head on her delicate knee
And list to her murmuring lips.

Then soft as the whisper of twilight she'd tell
Of the pilgrimage of the soul,
Of Karma's fight with the fiends of hell,
And how at the end the dead rest well
In Nirvana, the strange far goal.

Oh, to loose my soul from these leaden skies,
This wakeful, tormented strand,
From cold and the scorn of withered eyes,
To dwell in that dreamy paradise,
A native of India Land!
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Author of original: 
Gustaf Fröding
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