Second Reading

Cleopatra

His legs bestrid the ocean; his reared arm

Crested the world; his voice was propertied

As all the tuned spheres, and that to friends;

But when he meant to quail and shake the orb,

He was as rattling thunder. For his bounty,

There was no winter in't: an Antony it was

That grew the more by reaping. His delights

Were dolphinlike, they showed his back above

The lement they lived in. In his livery

Walked crowns and crownets; realms and islands were

As plates dropped from his pocket,

Dolabella                                        Cleopatra-

Cleopatra

You lie up to the hearing of the gods.

But if there be nor ever were one such,

It's past the size of dreaming. Nature wants stuff

To vie strange forms with fancy, yet t' imagine

An Antony were nature's piece 'gainst fancy,

Condemning shadows quite. (Shakespeare, 1696-7, Act V, Sc. 2, Vrs. 83-101)

Work Cited:

Shakespeare, William. "Antony and Cleopatra." The Complete Pelican Shakespeare. Ed. Stephen Orgell and A.R. Braunmuller. New York: Penguin Group, 2002. Print.