Notes:  “Protus” sets in contrast the representations by artist and annalist of the two busts and the two lives of Protus, the baby emperor of Byzantium, born in the purple, gently nurtured and cherished, yet fated to obscurity, and of John, the blacksmith’s bastard, predestined to usurp his throne and save the empire with his harder hand.

THE STATUE AND THE BUST

There’s a palace in Florence, the world knows well,
And a statue watches it from the square,
And this story of both do our townsmen tell.

Ages ago, a lady there,
At the farthest window facing the East
Asked, “Who rides by with the royal air?”

The bridesmaids’ prattle around her ceased;
She leaned forth, one on either hand;
They saw how the blush of the bride increased—­

They felt by its beats her heart expand—­ 10
As one at each ear and both in a breath
Whispered, “The Great-Duke Ferdinand.”

That self-same instant, underneath,
The Duke rode past in his idle way,
Empty and fine like a swordless sheath.

Gay he rode, with a friend as gay,
Till he threw his head back—­“Who is she?”
“A bride the Riccardi brings home to-day.”

Hair in heaps lay heavily
Over a pale brow spirit-pure—­ 20
Carved like the heart of a coal-black tree,

Crisped like a war-steed’s encolure—­
And vainly sought to dissemble her eyes
Of the blackest black our eyes endure.

And lo, a blade for a knight’s emprise
Filled the fine empty sheath of a man—­
The Duke grew straightway brave and wise.

He looked at her, as a lover can;
She looked at him, as one who awakes: 
The past was a sleep, and her life began. 30

Now, love so ordered for both their sakes,
A feast was held that selfsame night
In the pile which the mighty shadow makes.

(For Via Larga is three-parts light,
But the palace overshadows one,
Because of a crime which may God requite!

To Florence and God the wrong was done,
Through the first republic’s murder there
By Cosimo and his cursed son.)

The Duke (with the statue’s face in the square) 40
Turned in the midst of his multitude
At the bright approach of the bridal pair.

Face to face the lovers stood
A single minute and no more,
While the bridegroom bent as a man subdued—­

Bowed till his bonnet brushed the floor—­
For the Duke on the lady a kiss conferred,
As the courtly custom was of yore.

In a minute can lovers exchange a word? 
If a word did pass, which I do not think, 50
Only one out of the thousand heard.

That was the bridegroom.  At day’s brink
He and his bride were alone at last
In a bedchamber by a taper’s blink.