차이

문서의 선택한 두 판 사이의 차이를 보여줍니다.

--- 문학:영문학:영국:키츠 [2023/07/27 02:14]
clayeryan@gmail.com [작품목록]
+++ 문학:영문학:영국:키츠 [2023/09/14 23:16] (현재)
clayeryan@gmail.com
@@ 줄 23: / 줄 23: @@
 Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
 Till love and fame to nothingness do sink
+**내가 더 이상 존재하지 않을 수도 있다는 두려움을 가질 때**
+내가 더 이상 존재하지 않을 수도 있다는 두려움을 가질 때
+내 펜이 나의 넘쳐나는 생각을 수확하기 전에,
+높이 쌓인 책들이 넉넉한 곳간처럼,
+글자로써, 잘 여문 곡식알을 채우기 전에;
+별빛 박힌 밤하늘에 거대한 구름이 그리는,
+아기자기한 옛 이야기의 상징들을 바라보며,
+타고난 마술의 손으로 그 자취를 찾기 전에
+행여 내가 죽을지도 모른다는 생각이 들 때,
+또한 한 때 짧은 순간 만났던 아름다운 그대
+그대 다시는 보지 못하리라 느껴지고
+분별없는 사랑의 마술도 이제 끝이라고
+생각되어질 때, 나는 광막한 세계의
+해변에 외로이 서서 생각에 잠깁니다.
+사랑과 명예가 허무한 것이 될 때까지
 </poem>	++++
 ++++	2. Ode To A Nightingale	|
@@ 줄 3055: / 줄 3073: @@
 They stept into the boat, and launch'd from land.
 	</poem>	++++
-++++	24. Bright Star, Would I Were Steadfast As Thou Art	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+++++	24. Bright Star, Would I Were Steadfast As Thou Art	|	<poem>
-++++	25. Robin Hood	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art—
-++++	26. On Fame	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
-++++	27. On Seeing The Elgin Marbles For The First Time	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+And watching, with eternal lids apart,
-++++	28. Why Did I Laugh Tonight? No Voice Will Tell	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
-++++	29. To A Friend Who Sent Me Some Roses	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+The moving waters at their priestlike task
-++++	30. Happy Is England! I Could Be Content	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
-++++	31. Epistle To My Brother George	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
-++++	32. Written On A Summer Evening	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—
-++++	33. The Day Is Gone, And All Its Sweets Are Gone	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+No—yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,
-++++	34. To A Young Lady Who Sent Me A Laurel Crown	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
-++++	35. Hither, Hither, Love	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
-++++	36. O Solitude! If I Must With Thee Dwell	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
-++++	37. If By Dull Rhymes Our English Must Be Chain'd	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
-++++	38. Hymn To Apollo	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+And so live ever—or else swoon to death.
-++++	39. On Sitting Down To Read King Lear Once Again	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+	</poem>	++++
-++++	40. To Fanny	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+++++	25. Robin Hood	|	<poem>
-++++	41. Endymion: Book IV	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+to a friend
-++++	42. A Dream, After Reading Dante's Episode Of Paolo And Francesca	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
-++++	43. Meg Merrilies	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+No! those days are gone away
-++++	44. Think Of It Not, Sweet One	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+And their hours are old and gray,
-++++	45. Ode To Autumn	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+And their minutes buried all
-++++	46. To The Nile	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Under the down-trodden pall
-++++	47. Endymion: Book III	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Of the leaves of many years:
-++++	48. Addressed To Haydon	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Many times have winter's shears,
-++++	49. Endymion: Book II	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Frozen North, and chilling East,
-++++	50. O Blush Not So!	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Sounded tempests to the feast
-++++	51. Where Be Ye Going, You Devon Maid?	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Of the forest's whispering fleeces,
-++++	52. Isabella or The Pot of Basil	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Since men knew nor rent nor leases.
-++++	53. To—	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
-++++	54. To Homer	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+No, the bugle sounds no more,
-++++	55. Answer To A Sonnet By J.H.Reynolds	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+And the twanging bow no more;
-++++	56. Written On The Day That Mr Leigh Hunt Left Prison	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Silent is the ivory shrill
-++++	57. Lines On The Mermaid Tavern	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Past the heath and up the hill;
-++++	58. To One Who Has Been Long In City Pent	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+There is no mid-forest laugh,
-++++	59. This Living Hand	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Where lone Echo gives the half
-++++	60. A Thing of Beauty (Endymion)	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+To some wight, amaz'd to hear
-++++	61. How Many Bards Gild The Lapses Of Time!	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Jesting, deep in forest drear.
-++++	62. To John Hamilton Reynolds	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
-++++	63. To Ailsa Rock	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+On the fairest time of June
-++++	64. Written Before Re-Reading King Lear	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+You may go, with sun or moon,
-++++	65. Written On A Blank Space At The End Of Chaucer's Tale Of The Flowre And The Lefe	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Or the seven stars to light you,
-++++	66. Written On A Blank Space At The End Of Chaucer's Tale Of The Flowre And The Lefe	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Or the polar ray to right you;
-++++	67. To Haydon	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+But you never may behold
-++++	68. To G.A.W.	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Little John, or Robin bold;
-++++	69. Give Me Women, Wine, and Snuff	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Never one, of all the clan,
-++++	70. His Last Sonnet	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Thrumming on an empty can
-++++	71. Last Sonnet	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Some old hunting ditty, while
-++++	72. Fancy	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+He doth his green way beguile
-++++	73. Fill For Me A Brimming Bowl	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+To fair hostess Merriment,
-++++	74. To Byron	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Down beside the pasture Trent;
-++++	75. Ode to Fanny	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+For he left the merry tale
-++++	76. Where's the Poet?	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Messenger for spicy ale.
-++++	77. Stanzas	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
-++++	78. Song of the Indian Maid, from 'Endymion'	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Gone, the merry morris din;
-++++	79. Song of the Indian Maid, from 'Endymion'	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Gone, the song of Gamelyn;
-++++	80. Keen, Fitful Gusts are Whisp'ring Here and There	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Gone, the tough-belted outlaw
-++++	81. To Mrs Reynolds' Cat	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Idling in the "grenè shawe";
-++++	82. Fragment of an Ode to Maia	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+All are gone away and past!
-++++	83. Lines from Endymion	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+And if Robin should be cast
-++++	84. Bards of Passion and of Mirth, written on the Blank Page before Beaumont and Fletcher's Tragi-Comedy 'The Fair Maid of the Inn'	|	<poem>	</poem>	++++
+Sudden from his turfed grave,
+And if Marian should have
+Once again her forest days,
+She would weep, and he would craze:
+He would swear, for all his oaks,
+Fall'n beneath the dockyard strokes,
+Have rotted on the briny seas;
+She would weep that her wild bees
+Sang not to her--strange! that honey
+Can't be got without hard money!
+So it is: yet let us sing,
+Honour to the old bow-string!
+Honour to the bugle-horn!
+Honour to the woods unshorn!
+Honour to the Lincoln green!
+Honour to the archer keen!
+Honour to tight little John,
+And the horse he rode upon!
+Honour to bold Robin Hood,
+Sleeping in the underwood!
+Honour to maid Marian,
+And to all the Sherwood-clan!
+Though their days have hurried by
+Let us two a burden try.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	26. On Fame	|	<poem>
+Fame, like a wayward girl, will still be coy
+To those who woo her with too slavish knees,
+But makes surrender to some thoughtless boy,
+And dotes the more upon a heart at ease;
+She is a Gypsy,—will not speak to those
+Who have not learnt to be content without her;
+A Jilt, whose ear was never whispered close,
+Who thinks they scandal her who talk about her;
+A very Gypsy is she, Nilus-born,
+Sister-in-law to jealous Potiphar;
+Ye love-sick Bards! repay her scorn for scorn;
+Ye Artists lovelorn! madmen that ye are!
+Makeyour best bow to her and bid adieu,
+Then, if she likes it, she will follow you.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	27. On Seeing The Elgin Marbles For The First Time	|	<poem>
+My spirit is too weak; mortality
+Weighs heavily on me like unwilling sleep,
+And each imagined pinnacle and steep
+Of godlike hardship tells me I must die
+Like a sick eagle looking at the sky.
+Yet 'tis a gentle luxury to weep,
+That I have not the cloudy winds to keep
+Fresh for the opening of the morning's eye.
+Such dim-conceived glories of the brain
+Bring round the heart an indescribable feud;
+So do these wonders a most dizzy pain,
+That mingles Grecian grandeur with the rude
+Wasting of old Time—with a billowy main,
+A sun, a shadow of a magnitude.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	28. Why Did I Laugh Tonight? No Voice Will Tell	|	<poem>
+Why did I laugh tonight? No voice will tell:
+No God, no Demon of severe response,
+Deigns to reply from Heaven or from Hell.
+Then to my human heart I turn at once.
+Heart! Thou and I are here, sad and alone;
+I say, why did I laugh? O mortal pain!
+O Darkness! Darkness! ever must I moan,
+To question Heaven and Hell and Heart in vain.
+Why did I laugh? I know this Being's lease,
+My fancy to its utmost blisses spreads;
+Yet would I on this very midnight cease,
+And the world's gaudy ensigns see in shreds;
+Verse, Fame, and Beauty are intense indeed,
+But Death intenser—Death is Life's high meed.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	29. To A Friend Who Sent Me Some Roses	|	<poem>
+As late I rambled in the happy fields,
+What time the skylark shakes the tremulous dew
+From his lush clover covert;—when anew
+Adventurous knights take up their dinted shields;
+I saw the sweetest flower wild nature yields,
+A fresh-blown musk-rose; 'twas the first that threw
+Its sweets upon the summer: graceful it grew
+As is the wand that Queen Titania wields.
+And, as I feasted on its fragrancy,
+I thought the garden-rose it far excelled;
+But when, O Wells! thy roses came to me,
+My sense with their deliciousness was spelled:
+Soft voices had they, that with tender plea
+Whispered of peace, and truth, and friendliness unquelled.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	30. Happy Is England! I Could Be Content	|	<poem>
+Happy is England! I could be content
+To see no other verdure than its own;
+To feel no other breezes than are blown
+Through its tall woods with high romances blent;
+Yet do I sometimes feel a languishment
+For skies Italian, and an inward groan
+To sit upon an Alp as on a throne,
+And half forget what world or worldling meant.
+Happy is England, sweet her artless daughters;
+Enough their simple loveliness for me,
+Enough their whitest arms in silence clinging;
+Yet do I often warmly burn to see
+Beauties of deeper glance, and hear their singing,
+And float with them about the summer waters.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	31. Epistle To My Brother George	|	<poem>
+Full many a dreary hour have I past,
+My brain bewildered, and my mind o'ercast
+With heaviness; in seasons when I've thought
+No spherey strains by me could e'er be caught
+From the blue dome, though I to dimness gaze
+On the far depth where sheeted lightning plays;
+Or, on the wavy grass outstretched supinely,
+Pry 'mong the stars, to strive to think divinely:
+That I should never hear Apollo's song,
+Though feathery clouds were floating all along
+The purple west, and, two bright streaks between,
+The golden lyre itself were dimly seen:
+That the still murmur of the honey bee
+Would never teach a rural song to me:
+That the bright glance from beauty's eyelids slanting
+Would never make a lay of mine enchanting,
+Or warm my breast with ardour to unfold
+Some tale of love and arms in time of old.
+But there are times, when those that love the bay,
+Fly from all sorrowing far, far away;
+A sudden glow comes on them, nought they see
+In water, earth, or air, but poesy.
+It has been said, dear George, and true I hold it,
+(For knightly Spenser to Libertas told it,)
+That when a Poet is in such a trance,
+In air her sees white coursers paw, and prance,
+Bestridden of gay knights, in gay apparel,
+Who at each other tilt in playful quarrel,
+And what we, ignorantly, sheet-lightning call,
+Is the swift opening of their wide portal,
+When the bright warder blows his trumpet clear,
+Whose tones reach nought on earth but Poet's ear.
+When these enchanted portals open wide,
+And through the light the horsemen swiftly glide,
+The Poet's eye can reach those golden halls,
+And view the glory of their festivals:
+Their ladies fair, that in the distance seem
+Fit for the silv'ring of a seraph's dream;
+Their rich brimmed goblets, that incessant run
+Like the bright spots that move about the sun;
+And, when upheld, the wine from each bright jar
+Pours with the lustre of a falling star.
+Yet further off, are dimly seen their bowers,
+Of which, no mortal eye can reach the flowers;
+And 'tis right just, for well Apollo knows
+'Twould make the Poet quarrel with the rose.
+All that's revealed from that far seat of blisses
+Is the clear fountains' interchanging kisses,
+As gracefully descending, light and thin,
+Like silver streaks across a dolphin's fin,
+When he upswimmeth from the coral caves,
+And sports with half his tail above the waves.
+These wonders strange he sees, and many more,
+Whose head is pregnant with poetic lore.
+Should he upon an evening ramble fare
+With forehead to the soothing breezes bare,
+Would he nought see but the dark, silent blue
+With all its diamonds trembling through and through?
+Or the coy moon, when in the waviness
+Of whitest clouds she does her beauty dress,
+And staidly paces higher up, and higher,
+Like a sweet nun in holy-day attire?
+Ah, yes! much more would start into his sight—
+The revelries and mysteries of night:
+And should I ever see them, I will tell you
+Such tales as needs must with amazement spell you.
+These are the living pleasures of the bard:
+But richer far posterity's reward.
+What does he murmur with his latest breath,
+While his proud eye looks though the film of death?
+"What though I leave this dull and earthly mould,
+Yet shall my spirit lofty converse hold
+With after times.—The patriot shall feel
+My stern alarum, and unsheath his steel;
+Or, in the senate thunder out my numbers
+To startle princes from their easy slumbers.
+The sage will mingle with each moral theme
+My happy thoughts sententious; he will teem
+With lofty periods when my verses fire him,
+And then I'll stoop from heaven to inspire him.
+Lays have I left of such a dear delight
+That maids will sing them on their bridal night.
+Gay villagers, upon a morn of May,
+When they have tired their gentle limbs with play
+And formed a snowy circle on the grass,
+And placed in midst of all that lovely lass
+Who chosen is their queen,—with her fine head
+Crowned with flowers purple, white, and red:
+For there the lily, and the musk-rose, sighing,
+Are emblems true of hapless lovers dying:
+Between her breasts, that never yet felt trouble,
+A bunch of violets full blown, and double,
+Serenely sleep:—she from a casket takes
+A little book,—and then a joy awakes
+About each youthful heart,—with stifled cries,
+And rubbing of white hands, and sparkling eyes:
+For she's to read a tale of hopes, and fears;
+One that I fostered in my youthful years:
+The pearls, that on each glist'ning circlet sleep,
+Must ever and anon with silent creep,
+Lured by the innocent dimples. To sweet rest
+Shall the dear babe, upon its mother's breast,
+Be lulled with songs of mine. Fair world, adieu!
+Thy dales, and hills, are fading from my view:
+Swiftly I mount, upon wide spreading pinions,
+Far from the narrow bound of thy dominions.
+Full joy I feel, while thus I cleave the air,
+That my soft verse will charm thy daughters fair,
+And warm thy sons!" Ah, my dear friend and brother,
+Could I, at once, my mad ambition smother,
+For tasting joys like these, sure I should be
+Happier, and dearer to society.
+At times, 'tis true, I've felt relief from pain
+When some bright thought has darted through my brain:
+Through all that day I've felt a greater pleasure
+Than if I'd brought to light a hidden treasure.
+As to my sonnets, though none else should heed them,
+I feel delighted, still, that you should read them.
+Of late, too, I have had much calm enjoyment,
+Stretched on the grass at my best loved employment
+Of scribbling lines for you. These things I thought
+While, in my face, the freshest breeze I caught.
+E'en now I'm pillowed on a bed of flowers
+That crowns a lofty clift, which proudly towers
+Above the ocean-waves, The stalks, and blades,
+Chequer my tablet with their quivering shades.
+On one side is a field of drooping oats,
+Through which the poppies show their scarlet coats;
+So pert and useless, that they bring to mind
+The scarlet coats that pester human-kind.
+And on the other side, outspread, is seen
+Ocean's blue mantle streaked with purple, and green.
+Now 'tis I see a canvassed ship, and now
+Mark the bright silver curling round her prow.
+I see the lark dowm-dropping to his nest,
+And the broad winged sea-gull never at rest;
+For when no more he spreads his feathers free,
+His breast is dancing on the restless sea.
+Now I direct my eyes into the west,
+Which at this moment is in sunbeams drest:
+Why westward turn? 'Twas but to say adieu!
+'Twas but to kiss my hand, dear George, to you!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	32. Written On A Summer Evening	|	<poem>
+The church bells toll a melancholy round,
+Calling the people to some other prayers,
+Some other gloominess, more dreadful cares,
+More harkening to the sermon's horrid sound.
+Surely the mind of man is closely bound
+In some blind spell: seeing that each one tears
+Himself from fireside joys and Lydian airs,
+And converse high of those with glory crowned.
+Still, still they toll, and I should feel a damp,
+A chill as from a tomb, did I not know
+That they are dying like an outburnt lamp,—
+That 'tis their sighing, wailing, ere they go
+Into oblivion—that fresh flowers will grow,
+And many glories of immortal stamp.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	33. The Day Is Gone, And All Its Sweets Are Gone	|	<poem>
+The day is gone, and all its sweets are gone!
+Sweet voice, sweet lips, soft hand, and softer breast,
+Warm breath, light whisper, tender semitone,
+Bright eyes, accomplished shape, and lang'rous waist!
+Faded the flower and all its budded charms,
+Faded the sight of beauty from my eyes,
+Faded the shape of beauty from my arms,
+Faded the voice, warmth, whiteness, paradise—
+Vanished unseasonably at shut of eve,
+When the dusk holiday—or holinight
+Of fragrant-curtained love begins to weave
+The woof of darkness thick, for hid delight;
+But, as I've read love's missal through today,
+He'll let me sleep, seeing I fast and pray.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	34. To A Young Lady Who Sent Me A Laurel Crown	|	<poem>
+Fresh morning gusts have blown away all fear
+From my glad bosom,—now from gloominess
+I mount for ever—not an atom less
+Than the proud laurel shall content my bier.
+No! by the eternal stars! or why sit here
+In the Sun's eye, and 'gainst my temples press
+Apollo's very leaves, woven to bless
+By thy white fingers and thy spirit clear.
+Lo! who dares say, "Do this"? Who dares call down
+My will from its high purpose? Who say,"Stand,"
+Or, "Go"? This mighty moment I would frown
+On abject Caesars—not the stoutest band
+Of mailed heroes should tear off my crown:
+Yet would I kneel and kiss thy gentle hand.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	35. Hither, Hither, Love	|	<poem>
+Hither hither, love---
+'Tis a shady mead---
+Hither, hither, love!
+Let us feed and feed!
+Hither, hither, sweet---
+'Tis a cowslip bed---
+Hither, hither, sweet!
+'Tis with dew bespread!
+Hither, hither, dear
+By the breath of life,
+Hither, hither, dear!---
+Be the summer's wife!
+Though one moment's pleasure
+In one moment flies---
+Though the passion's treasure
+In one moment dies;---
+Yet it has not passed---
+Think how near, how near!---
+And while it doth last,
+Think how dear, how dear!
+Hither, hither, hither
+Love its boon has sent---
+If I die and wither
+I shall die content!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	36. O Solitude! If I Must With Thee Dwell	|	<poem>
+O Solitude! if I must with thee dwell,
+Let it not be among the jumbled heap
+Of murky buildings: climb with me the steep,—
+Nature's observatory—whence the dell,
+In flowery slopes, its river's crystal swell,
+May seem a span; let me thy vigils keep
+'Mongst boughs pavilioned, where the deer's swift leap
+Startles the wild bee from the foxglove bell.
+But though I'll gladly trace these scenes with thee,
+Yet the sweet converse of an innocent mind,
+Whose words are images of thoughts refined,
+Is my soul's pleasure; and it sure must be
+Almost the highest bliss of human-kind,
+When to thy haunts two kindred spirits flee.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	37. If By Dull Rhymes Our English Must Be Chain'd	|	<poem>
+If by dull rhymes our English must be chain'd,
+And, like Andromeda, the Sonnet sweet
+Fetter'd, in spite of pained loveliness;
+Let us find out, if we must be constrain'd,
+Sandals more interwoven and complete
+To fit the naked foot of poesy;
+Let us inspect the lyre, and weigh the stress
+Of every chord, and see what may be gain'd
+By ear industrious, and attention meet:
+Misers of sound and syllable, no less
+Than Midas of his coinage, let us be
+Jealous of dead leaves in the bay wreath crown;
+So, if we may not let the Muse be free,
+She will be bound with garlands of her own.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	38. Hymn To Apollo	|	<poem>
+God of the golden bow,
+And of the golden lyre,
+And of the golden hair,
+And of the golden fire,
+Charioteer
+Of the patient year,
+Where---where slept thine ire,
+When like a blank idiot I put on thy wreath,
+Thy laurel, thy glory,
+The light of thy story,
+Or was I a worm---too low crawling for death?
+O Delphic Apollo!
+The Thunderer grasp'd and grasp'd,
+The Thunderer frown'd and frown'd;
+The eagle's feathery mane
+For wrath became stiffen'd---the sound
+Of breeding thunder
+Went drowsily under,
+Muttering to be unbound.
+O why didst thou pity, and beg for a worm?
+Why touch thy soft lute
+Till the thunder was mute,
+Why was I not crush'd---such a pitiful germ?
+O Delphic Apollo!
+The Pleiades were up,
+Watching the silent air;
+The seeds and roots in Earth
+Were swelling for summer fare;
+The Ocean, its neighbour,
+Was at his old labour,
+When, who---who did dare
+To tie for a moment, thy plant round his brow,
+And grin and look proudly,
+And blaspheme so loudly,
+And live for that honour, to stoop to thee now?
+O Delphic Apollo!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	39. On Sitting Down To Read King Lear Once Again	|	<poem>
+O golden-tongued Romance with serene lute!
+Fair plumed Syren! Queen of far away!
+Leave melodizing on this wintry day,
+Shut up thine olden pages, and be mute:
+Adieu! for once again the fierce dispute,
+Betwixt damnation and impassion'd clay
+Must I burn through; once more humbly assay
+The bitter-sweet of this Shakespearian fruit.
+Chief Poet! and ye clouds of Albion,
+Begetters of our deep eternal theme,
+When through the old oak forest I am gone,
+Let me not wander in a barren dream,
+But when I am consumed in the fire,
+Give me new Phoenix wings to fly at my desire.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	40. To Fanny	|	<poem>
+I cry your mercy—pity—love!—aye, love!
+Merciful love that tantalizes not,
+One-thoughted, never-wandering, guileless love,
+Unmasked, and being seen—without a blot!
+O! let me have thee whole,—all—all—be mine!
+That shape, that fairness, that sweet minor zest
+Of love, your kiss,—those hands, those eyes divine,
+That warm, white, lucent, million-pleasured breast,—
+Yourself—your soul—in pity give me all,
+Withhold no atom's atom or I die,
+Or living on, perhaps, your wretched thrall,
+Forget, in the mist of idle misery,
+Life's purposes,—the palate of my mind
+Losing its gust, and my ambition blind!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	41. Endymion: Book IV	|	<poem>
+Muse of my native land! loftiest Muse!
+O first-born on the mountains! by the hues
+Of heaven on the spiritual air begot:
+Long didst thou sit alone in northern grot,
+While yet our England was a wolfish den;
+Before our forests heard the talk of men;
+Before the first of Druids was a child;--
+Long didst thou sit amid our regions wild
+Rapt in a deep prophetic solitude.
+There came an eastern voice of solemn mood:--
+Yet wast thou patient. Then sang forth the Nine,
+Apollo's garland:--yet didst thou divine
+Such home-bred glory, that they cry'd in vain,
+"Come hither, Sister of the Island!" Plain
+Spake fair Ausonia; and once more she spake
+A higher summons:--still didst thou betake
+Thee to thy native hopes. O thou hast won
+A full accomplishment! The thing is done,
+Which undone, these our latter days had risen
+On barren souls. Great Muse, thou know'st what prison
+Of flesh and bone, curbs, and confines, and frets
+Our spirit's wings: despondency besets
+Our pillows; and the fresh to-morrow morn
+Seems to give forth its light in very scorn
+Of our dull, uninspired, snail-paced lives.
+Long have I said, how happy he who shrives
+To thee! But then I thought on poets gone,
+And could not pray:--nor can I now--so on
+I move to the end in lowliness of heart.----
+"Ah, woe is me! that I should fondly part
+From my dear native land! Ah, foolish maid!
+Glad was the hour, when, with thee, myriads bade
+Adieu to Ganges and their pleasant fields!
+To one so friendless the clear freshet yields
+A bitter coolness, the ripe grape is sour:
+Yet I would have, great gods! but one short hour
+Of native air--let me but die at home."
+Endymion to heaven's airy dome
+Was offering up a hecatomb of vows,
+When these words reach'd him. Whereupon he bows
+His head through thorny-green entanglement
+Of underwood, and to the sound is bent,
+Anxious as hind towards her hidden fawn.
+"Is no one near to help me? No fair dawn
+Of life from charitable voice? No sweet saying
+To set my dull and sadden'd spirit playing?
+No hand to toy with mine? No lips so sweet
+That I may worship them? No eyelids meet
+To twinkle on my bosom? No one dies
+Before me, till from these enslaving eyes
+Redemption sparkles!--I am sad and lost."
+Thou, Carian lord, hadst better have been tost
+Into a whirlpool. Vanish into air,
+Warm mountaineer! for canst thou only bear
+A woman's sigh alone and in distress?
+See not her charms! Is Phoebe passionless?
+Phoebe is fairer far--O gaze no more:--
+Yet if thou wilt behold all beauty's store,
+Behold her panting in the forest grass!
+Do not those curls of glossy jet surpass
+For tenderness the arms so idly lain
+Amongst them? Feelest not a kindred pain,
+To see such lovely eyes in swimming search
+After some warm delight, that seems to perch
+Dovelike in the dim cell lying beyond
+Their upper lids?--Hist! "O for Hermes' wand
+To touch this flower into human shape!
+That woodland Hyacinthus could escape
+From his green prison, and here kneeling down
+Call me his queen, his second life's fair crown!
+Ah me, how I could love!--My soul doth melt
+For the unhappy youth--Love! I have felt
+So faint a kindness, such a meek surrender
+To what my own full thoughts had made too tender,
+That but for tears my life had fled away!--
+Ye deaf and senseless minutes of the day,
+And thou, old forest, hold ye this for true,
+There is no lightning, no authentic dew
+But in the eye of love: there's not a sound,
+Melodious howsoever, can confound
+The heavens and earth in one to such a death
+As doth the voice of love: there's not a breath
+Will mingle kindly with the meadow air,
+Till it has panted round, and stolen a share
+Of passion from the heart!"--
+Upon a bough
+He leant, wretched. He surely cannot now
+Thirst for another love: O impious,
+That he can even dream upon it thus!--
+Thought he, "Why am I not as are the dead,
+Since to a woe like this I have been led
+Through the dark earth, and through the wondrous sea?
+Goddess! I love thee not the less: from thee
+By Juno's smile I turn not--no, no, no--
+While the great waters are at ebb and flow.--
+I have a triple soul! O fond pretence--
+For both, for both my love is so immense,
+I feel my heart is cut in twain for them."
+And so he groan'd, as one by beauty slain.
+The lady's heart beat quick, and he could see
+Her gentle bosom heave tumultuously.
+He sprang from his green covert: there she lay,
+Sweet as a muskrose upon new-made hay;
+With all her limbs on tremble, and her eyes
+Shut softly up alive. To speak he tries.
+"Fair damsel, pity me! forgive that I
+Thus violate thy bower's sanctity!
+O pardon me, for I am full of grief--
+Grief born of thee, young angel! fairest thief!
+Who stolen hast away the wings wherewith
+I was to top the heavens. Dear maid, sith
+Thou art my executioner, and I feel
+Loving and hatred, misery and weal,
+Will in a few short hours be nothing to me,
+And all my story that much passion slew me;
+Do smile upon the evening of my days:
+And, for my tortur'd brain begins to craze,
+Be thou my nurse; and let me understand
+How dying I shall kiss that lily hand.--
+Dost weep for me? Then should I be content.
+Scowl on, ye fates! until the firmament
+Outblackens Erebus, and the full-cavern'd earth
+Crumbles into itself. By the cloud girth
+Of Jove, those tears have given me a thirst
+To meet oblivion."--As her heart would burst
+The maiden sobb'd awhile, and then replied:
+"Why must such desolation betide
+As that thou speakest of? Are not these green nooks
+Empty of all misfortune? Do the brooks
+Utter a gorgon voice? Does yonder thrush,
+Schooling its half-fledg'd little ones to brush
+About the dewy forest, whisper tales?--
+Speak not of grief, young stranger, or cold snails
+Will slime the rose to night. Though if thou wilt,
+Methinks 'twould be a guilt--a very guilt--
+Not to companion thee, and sigh away
+The light--the dusk--the dark--till break of day!"
+"Dear lady," said Endymion, "'tis past:
+I love thee! and my days can never last.
+That I may pass in patience still speak:
+Let me have music dying, and I seek
+No more delight--I bid adieu to all.
+Didst thou not after other climates call,
+And murmur about Indian streams?"--Then she,
+Sitting beneath the midmost forest tree,
+For pity sang this roundelay------
+"O Sorrow,
+Why dost borrow
+The natural hue of health, from vermeil lips?--
+To give maiden blushes
+To the white rose bushes?
+Or is it thy dewy hand the daisy tips?
+"O Sorrow,
+Why dost borrow
+The lustrous passion from a falcon-eye?--
+To give the glow-worm light?
+Or, on a moonless night,
+To tinge, on syren shores, the salt sea-spry?
+"O Sorrow,
+Why dost borrow
+The mellow ditties from a mourning tongue?--
+To give at evening pale
+Unto the nightingale,
+That thou mayst listen the cold dews among?
+"O Sorrow,
+Why dost borrow
+Heart's lightness from the merriment of May?--
+A lover would not tread
+A cowslip on the head,
+Though he should dance from eve till peep of day--
+Nor any drooping flower
+Held sacred for thy bower,
+Wherever he may sport himself and play.
+"To Sorrow
+I bade good-morrow,
+And thought to leave her far away behind;
+But cheerly, cheerly,
+She loves me dearly;
+She is so constant to me, and so kind:
+I would deceive her
+And so leave her,
+But ah! she is so constant and so kind.
+"Beneath my palm trees, by the river side,
+I sat a weeping: in the whole world wide
+There was no one to ask me why I wept,--
+And so I kept
+Brimming the water-lily cups with tears
+Cold as my fears.
+"Beneath my palm trees, by the river side,
+I sat a weeping: what enamour'd bride,
+Cheated by shadowy wooer from the clouds,
+But hides and shrouds
+Beneath dark palm trees by a river side?
+"And as I sat, over the light blue hills
+There came a noise of revellers: the rills
+Into the wide stream came of purple hue--
+'Twas Bacchus and his crew!
+The earnest trumpet spake, and silver thrills
+From kissing cymbals made a merry din--
+'Twas Bacchus and his kin!
+Like to a moving vintage down they came,
+Crown'd with green leaves, and faces all on flame;
+All madly dancing through the pleasant valley,
+To scare thee, Melancholy!
+O then, O then, thou wast a simple name!
+And I forgot thee, as the berried holly
+By shepherds is forgotten, when, in June,
+Tall chesnuts keep away the sun and moon:--
+I rush'd into the folly!
+"Within his car, aloft, young Bacchus stood,
+Trifling his ivy-dart, in dancing mood,
+With sidelong laughing;
+And little rills of crimson wine imbrued
+His plump white arms, and shoulders, enough white
+For Venus' pearly bite;
+And near him rode Silenus on his ass,
+Pelted with flowers as he on did pass
+Tipsily quaffing.
+"Whence came ye, merry Damsels! whence came ye!
+So many, and so many, and such glee?
+Why have ye left your bowers desolate,
+Your lutes, and gentler fate?--
+‘We follow Bacchus! Bacchus on the wing?
+A conquering!
+Bacchus, young Bacchus! good or ill betide,
+We dance before him thorough kingdoms wide:--
+Come hither, lady fair, and joined be
+To our wild minstrelsy!'
+"Whence came ye, jolly Satyrs! whence came ye!
+So many, and so many, and such glee?
+Why have ye left your forest haunts, why left
+Your nuts in oak-tree cleft?--
+‘For wine, for wine we left our kernel tree;
+For wine we left our heath, and yellow brooms,
+And cold mushrooms;
+For wine we follow Bacchus through the earth;
+Great God of breathless cups and chirping mirth!--
+Come hither, lady fair, and joined be
+To our mad minstrelsy!'
+"Over wide streams and mountains great we went,
+And, save when Bacchus kept his ivy tent,
+Onward the tiger and the leopard pants,
+With Asian elephants:
+Onward these myriads--with song and dance,
+With zebras striped, and sleek Arabians' prance,
+Web-footed alligators, crocodiles,
+Bearing upon their scaly backs, in files,
+Plump infant laughers mimicking the coil
+Of seamen, and stout galley-rowers' toil:
+With toying oars and silken sails they glide,
+Nor care for wind and tide.
+"Mounted on panthers' furs and lions' manes,
+From rear to van they scour about the plains;
+A three days' journey in a moment done:
+And always, at the rising of the sun,
+About the wilds they hunt with spear and horn,
+On spleenful unicorn.
+"I saw Osirian Egypt kneel adown
+Before the vine-wreath crown!
+I saw parch'd Abyssinia rouse and sing
+To the silver cymbals' ring!
+I saw the whelming vintage hotly pierce
+Old Tartary the fierce!
+The kings of Inde their jewel-sceptres vail,
+And from their treasures scatter pearled hail;
+Great Brahma from his mystic heaven groans,
+And all his priesthood moans;
+Before young Bacchus' eye-wink turning pale.--
+Into these regions came I following him,
+Sick hearted, weary--so I took a whim
+To stray away into these forests drear
+Alone, without a peer:
+And I have told thee all thou mayest hear.
+"Young stranger!
+I've been a ranger
+In search of pleasure throughout every clime:
+Alas! 'tis not for me!
+Bewitch'd I sure must be,
+To lose in grieving all my maiden prime.
+"Come then, Sorrow!
+Sweetest Sorrow!
+Like an own babe I nurse thee on my breast:
+I thought to leave thee
+And deceive thee,
+But now of all the world I love thee best.
+"There is not one,
+No, no, not one
+But thee to comfort a poor lonely maid;
+Thou art her mother,
+And her brother,
+Her playmate, and her wooer in the shade."
+O what a sigh she gave in finishing,
+And look, quite dead to every worldly thing!
+Endymion could not speak, but gazed on her;
+And listened to the wind that now did stir
+About the crisped oaks full drearily,
+Yet with as sweet a softness as might be
+Remember'd from its velvet summer song.
+At last he said: "Poor lady, how thus long
+Have I been able to endure that voice?
+Fair Melody! kind Syren! I've no choice;
+I must be thy sad servant evermore:
+I cannot choose but kneel here and adore.
+Alas, I must not think--by Phoebe, no!
+Let me not think, soft Angel! shall it be so?
+Say, beautifullest, shall I never think?
+O thou could'st foster me beyond the brink
+Of recollection! make my watchful care
+Close up its bloodshot eyes, nor see despair!
+Do gently murder half my soul, and I
+Shall feel the other half so utterly!--
+I'm giddy at that cheek so fair and smooth;
+O let it blush so ever! let it soothe
+My madness! let it mantle rosy-warm
+With the tinge of love, panting in safe alarm.--
+This cannot be thy hand, and yet it is;
+And this is sure thine other softling--this
+Thine own fair bosom, and I am so near!
+Wilt fall asleep? O let me sip that tear!
+And whisper one sweet word that I may know
+This is this world--sweet dewy blossom!"--Woe!
+Woe! Woe to that Endymion! Where is he?--
+Even these words went echoing dismally
+Through the wide forest--a most fearful tone,
+Like one repenting in his latest moan;
+And while it died away a shade pass'd by,
+As of a thunder cloud. When arrows fly
+Through the thick branches, poor ring-doves sleek forth
+Their timid necks and tremble; so these both
+Leant to each other trembling, and sat so
+Waiting for some destruction--when lo,
+Foot-feather'd Mercury appear'd sublime
+Beyond the tall tree tops; and in less time
+Than shoots the slanted hail-storm, down he dropt
+Towards the ground; but rested not, nor stopt
+One moment from his home: only the sward
+He with his wand light touch'd, and heavenward
+Swifter than sight was gone--even before
+The teeming earth a sudden witness bore
+Of his swift magic. Diving swans appear
+Above the crystal circlings white and clear;
+And catch the cheated eye in wild surprise,
+How they can dive in sight and unseen rise--
+So from the turf outsprang two steeds jet-black,
+Each with large dark blue wings upon his back.
+The youth of Caria plac'd the lovely dame
+On one, and felt himself in spleen to tame
+The other's fierceness. Through the air they flew,
+High as the eagles. Like two drops of dew
+Exhal'd to Phoebus' lips, away they are gone,
+Far from the earth away--unseen, alone,
+Among cool clouds and winds, but that the free,
+The buoyant life of song can floating be
+Above their heads, and follow them untir'd.--
+Muse of my native land, am I inspir'd?
+This is the giddy air, and I must spread
+Wide pinions to keep here; nor do I dread
+Or height, or depth, or width, or any chance
+Precipitous: I have beneath my glance
+Those towering horses and their mournful freight.
+Could I thus sail, and see, and thus await
+Fearless for power of thought, without thine aid?--
+There is a sleepy dusk, an odorous shade
+From some approaching wonder, and behold
+Those winged steeds, with snorting nostrils bold
+Snuff at its faint extreme, and seem to tire,
+Dying to embers from their native fire!
+There curl'd a purple mist around them; soon,
+It seem'd as when around the pale new moon
+Sad Zephyr droops the clouds like weeping willow:
+'Twas Sleep slow journeying with head on pillow.
+For the first time, since he came nigh dead born
+From the old womb of night, his cave forlorn
+Had he left more forlorn; for the first time,
+He felt aloof the day and morning's prime--
+Because into his depth Cimmerian
+There came a dream, shewing how a young man,
+Ere a lean bat could plump its wintery skin,
+Would at high Jove's empyreal footstool win
+An immortality, and how espouse
+Jove's daughter, and be reckon'd of his house.
+Now was he slumbering towards heaven's gate,
+That he might at the threshold one hour wait
+To hear the marriage melodies, and then
+Sink downward to his dusky cave again.
+His litter of smooth semilucent mist,
+Diversely ting'd with rose and amethyst,
+Puzzled those eyes that for the centre sought;
+And scarcely for one moment could be caught
+His sluggish form reposing motionless.
+Those two on winged steeds, with all the stress
+Of vision search'd for him, as one would look
+Athwart the sallows of a river nook
+To catch a glance at silver throated eels,--
+Or from old Skiddaw's top, when fog conceals
+His rugged forehead in a mantle pale,
+With an eye-guess towards some pleasant vale
+Descry a favourite hamlet faint and far.
+These raven horses, though they foster'd are
+Of earth's splenetic fire, dully drop
+Their full-veined ears, nostrils blood wide, and stop;
+Upon the spiritless mist have they outspread
+Their ample feathers, are in slumber dead,--
+And on those pinions, level in mid air,
+Endymion sleepeth and the lady fair.
+Slowly they sail, slowly as icy isle
+Upon a calm sea drifting: and meanwhile
+The mournful wanderer dreams. Behold! he walks
+On heaven's pavement; brotherly he talks
+To divine powers: from his hand full fain
+Juno's proud birds are pecking pearly grain:
+He tries the nerve of Phoebus' golden bow,
+And asketh where the golden apples grow:
+Upon his arm he braces Pallas' shield,
+And strives in vain to unsettle and wield
+A Jovian thunderbolt: arch Hebe brings
+A full-brimm'd goblet, dances lightly, sings
+And tantalizes long; at last he drinks,
+And lost in pleasure at her feet he sinks,
+Touching with dazzled lips her starlight hand.
+He blows a bugle,--an ethereal band
+Are visible above: the Seasons four,--
+Green-kyrtled Spring, flush Summer, golden store
+In Autumn's sickle, Winter frosty hoar,
+Join dance with shadowy Hours; while still the blast,
+In swells unmitigated, still doth last
+To sway their floating morris. "Whose is this?
+Whose bugle?" he inquires: they smile--"O Dis!
+Why is this mortal here? Dost thou not know
+Its mistress' lips? Not thou?--'Tis Dian's: lo!
+She rises crescented!" He looks, 'tis she,
+His very goddess: good-bye earth, and sea,
+And air, and pains, and care, and suffering;
+Good-bye to all but love! Then doth he spring
+Towards her, and awakes--and, strange, o'erhead,
+Of those same fragrant exhalations bred,
+Beheld awake his very dream: the gods
+Stood smiling; merry Hebe laughs and nods;
+And Phoebe bends towards him crescented.
+O state perplexing! On the pinion bed,
+Too well awake, he feels the panting side
+Of his delicious lady. He who died
+For soaring too audacious in the sun,
+Where that same treacherous wax began to run,
+Felt not more tongue-tied than Endymion.
+His heart leapt up as to its rightful throne,
+To that fair shadow'd passion puls'd its way--
+Ah, what perplexity! Ah, well a day!
+So fond, so beauteous was his bed-fellow,
+He could not help but kiss her: then he grew
+Awhile forgetful of all beauty save
+Young Phoebe's, golden hair'd; and so 'gan crave
+Forgiveness: yet he turn'd once more to look
+At the sweet sleeper,--all his soul was shook,--
+She press'd his hand in slumber; so once more
+He could not help but kiss her and adore.
+At this the shadow wept, melting away.
+The Latmian started up: "Bright goddess, stay!
+Search my most hidden breast! By truth's own tongue,
+I have no dædale heart: why is it wrung
+To desperation? Is there nought for me,
+Upon the bourne of bliss, but misery?"
+These words awoke the stranger of dark tresses:
+Her dawning love-look rapt Endymion blesses
+With 'haviour soft. Sleep yawned from underneath.
+"Thou swan of Ganges, let us no more breathe
+This murky phantasm! thou contented seem'st
+Pillow'd in lovely idleness, nor dream'st
+What horrors may discomfort thee and me.
+Ah, shouldst thou die from my heart-treachery!--
+Yet did she merely weep--her gentle soul
+Hath no revenge in it: as it is whole
+In tenderness, would I were whole in love!
+Can I prize thee, fair maid, all price above,
+Even when I feel as true as innocence?
+I do, I do.--What is this soul then? Whence
+Came it? It does not seem my own, and I
+Have no self-passion or identity.
+Some fearful end must be: where, where is it?
+By Nemesis, I see my spirit flit
+Alone about the dark--Forgive me, sweet:
+Shall we away?" He rous'd the steeds: they beat
+Their wings chivalrous into the clear air,
+Leaving old Sleep within his vapoury lair.
+The good-night blush of eve was waning slow,
+And Vesper, risen star, began to throe
+In the dusk heavens silvery, when they
+Thus sprang direct towards the Galaxy.
+Nor did speed hinder converse soft and strange--
+Eternal oaths and vows they interchange,
+In such wise, in such temper, so aloof
+Up in the winds, beneath a starry roof,
+So witless of their doom, that verily
+'Tis well nigh past man's search their hearts to see;
+Whether they wept, or laugh'd, or griev'd, or toy'd--
+Most like with joy gone mad, with sorrow cloy'd.
+Full facing their swift flight, from ebon streak,
+The moon put forth a little diamond peak,
+No bigger than an unobserved star,
+Or tiny point of fairy scymetar;
+Bright signal that she only stoop'd to tie
+Her silver sandals, ere deliciously
+She bow'd into the heavens her timid head.
+Slowly she rose, as though she would have fled,
+While to his lady meek the Carian turn'd,
+To mark if her dark eyes had yet discern'd
+This beauty in its birth--Despair! despair!
+He saw her body fading gaunt and spare
+In the cold moonshine. Straight he seiz'd her wrist;
+It melted from his grasp: her hand he kiss'd,
+And, horror! kiss'd his own--he was alone.
+Her steed a little higher soar'd, and then
+Dropt hawkwise to the earth. There lies a den,
+Beyond the seeming confines of the space
+Made for the soul to wander in and trace
+Its own existence, of remotest glooms.
+Dark regions are around it, where the tombs
+Of buried griefs the spirit sees, but scarce
+One hour doth linger weeping, for the pierce
+Of new-born woe it feels more inly smart:
+And in these regions many a venom'd dart
+At random flies; they are the proper home
+Of every ill: the man is yet to come
+Who hath not journeyed in this native hell.
+But few have ever felt how calm and well
+Sleep may be had in that deep den of all.
+There anguish does not sting; nor pleasure pall:
+Woe-hurricanes beat ever at the gate,
+Yet all is still within and desolate.
+Beset with painful gusts, within ye hear
+No sound so loud as when on curtain'd bier
+The death-watch tick is stifled. Enter none
+Who strive therefore: on the sudden it is won.
+Just when the sufferer begins to burn,
+Then it is free to him; and from an urn,
+Still fed by melting ice, he takes a draught--
+Young Semele such richness never quaft
+In her maternal longing. Happy gloom!
+Dark Paradise! where pale becomes the bloom
+Of health by due; where silence dreariest
+Is most articulate; where hopes infest;
+Where those eyes are the brightest far that keep
+Their lids shut longest in a dreamless sleep.
+O happy spirit-home! O wondrous soul!
+Pregnant with such a den to save the whole
+In thine own depth. Hail, gentle Carian!
+For, never since thy griefs and woes began,
+Hast thou felt so content: a grievous feud
+Hath let thee to this Cave of Quietude.
+Aye, his lull'd soul was there, although upborne
+With dangerous speed: and so he did not mourn
+Because he knew not whither he was going.
+So happy was he, not the aerial blowing
+Of trumpets at clear parley from the east
+Could rouse from that fine relish, that high feast.
+They stung the feather'd horse: with fierce alarm
+He flapp'd towards the sound. Alas, no charm
+Could lift Endymion's head, or he had view'd
+A skyey mask, a pinion'd multitude,--
+And silvery was its passing: voices sweet
+Warbling the while as if to lull and greet
+The wanderer in his path. Thus warbled they,
+While past the vision went in bright array.
+"Who, who from Dian's feast would be away?
+For all the golden bowers of the day
+Are empty left? Who, who away would be
+From Cynthia's wedding and festivity?
+Not Hesperus: lo! upon his silver wings
+He leans away for highest heaven and sings,
+Snapping his lucid fingers merrily!--
+Ah, Zephyrus! art here, and Flora too!
+Ye tender bibbers of the rain and dew,
+Young playmates of the rose and daffodil,
+Be careful, ere ye enter in, to fill
+Your baskets high
+With fennel green, and balm, and golden pines,
+Savory, latter-mint, and columbines,
+Cool parsley, basil sweet, and sunny thyme;
+Yea, every flower and leaf of every clime,
+All gather'd in the dewy morning: hie
+Away! fly, fly!--
+Crystalline brother of the belt of heaven,
+Aquarius! to whom king Jove has given
+Two liquid pulse streams 'stead of feather'd wings,
+Two fan-like fountains,--thine illuminings
+For Dian play:
+Dissolve the frozen purity of air;
+Let thy white shoulders silvery and bare
+Shew cold through watery pinions; make more bright
+The Star-Queen's crescent on her marriage night:
+Haste, haste away!--
+Castor has tamed the planet Lion, see!
+And of the Bear has Pollux mastery:
+A third is in the race! who is the third,
+Speeding away swift as the eagle bird?
+The ramping Centaur!
+The Lion's mane's on end: the Bear how fierce!
+The Centaur's arrow ready seems to pierce
+Some enemy: far forth his bow is bent
+Into the blue of heaven. He'll be shent,
+Pale unrelentor,
+When he shall hear the wedding lutes a playing.--
+Andromeda! sweet woman! why delaying
+So timidly among the stars: come hither!
+Join this bright throng, and nimbly follow whither
+They all are going.
+Danae's Son, before Jove newly bow'd,
+Has wept for thee, calling to Jove aloud.
+Thee, gentle lady, did he disenthral:
+Ye shall for ever live and love, for all
+Thy tears are flowing.--
+By Daphne's fright, behold Apollo!--"
+More
+Endymion heard not: down his steed him bore,
+Prone to the green head of a misty hill.
+His first touch of the earth went nigh to kill.
+"Alas!" said he, "were I but always borne
+Through dangerous winds, had but my footsteps worn
+A path in hell, for ever would I bless
+Horrors which nourish an uneasiness
+For my own sullen conquering: to him
+Who lives beyond earth's boundary, grief is dim,
+Sorrow is but a shadow: now I see
+The grass; I feel the solid ground--Ah, me!
+It is thy voice--divinest! Where?--who? who
+Left thee so quiet on this bed of dew?
+Behold upon this happy earth we are;
+Let us ay love each other; let us fare
+On forest-fruits, and never, never go
+Among the abodes of mortals here below,
+Or be by phantoms duped. O destiny!
+Into a labyrinth now my soul would fly,
+But with thy beauty will I deaden it.
+Where didst thou melt too? By thee will I sit
+For ever: let our fate stop here--a kid
+I on this spot will offer: Pan will bid
+Us live in peace, in love and peace among
+His forest wildernesses. I have clung
+To nothing, lov'd a nothing, nothing seen
+Or felt but a great dream! O I have been
+Presumptuous against love, against the sky,
+Against all elements, against the tie
+Of mortals each to each, against the blooms
+Of flowers, rush of rivers, and the tombs
+Of heroes gone! Against his proper glory
+Has my own soul conspired: so my story
+Will I to children utter, and repent.
+There never liv'd a mortal man, who bent
+His appetite beyond his natural sphere,
+But starv'd and died. My sweetest Indian, here,
+Here will I kneel, for thou redeemed hast
+My life from too thin breathing: gone and past
+Are cloudy phantasms. Caverns lone, farewel!
+And air of visions, and the monstrous swell
+Of visionary seas! No, never more
+Shall airy voices cheat me to the shore
+Of tangled wonder, breathless and aghast.
+Adieu, my daintiest Dream! although so vast
+My love is still for thee. The hour may come
+When we shall meet in pure elysium.
+On earth I may not love thee; and therefore
+Doves will I offer up, and sweetest store
+All through the teeming year: so thou wilt shine
+On me, and on this damsel fair of mine,
+And bless our simple lives. My Indian bliss!
+My river-lily bud! one human kiss!
+One sigh of real breath--one gentle squeeze,
+Warm as a dove's nest among summer trees,
+And warm with dew at ooze from living blood!
+Whither didst melt? Ah, what of that!--all good
+We'll talk about--no more of dreaming.--Now,
+Where shall our dwelling be? Under the brow
+Of some steep mossy hill, where ivy dun
+Would hide us up, although spring leaves were none;
+And where dark yew trees, as we rustle through,
+Will drop their scarlet berry cups of dew?
+O thou wouldst joy to live in such a place;
+Dusk for our loves, yet light enough to grace
+Those gentle limbs on mossy bed reclin'd:
+For by one step the blue sky shouldst thou find,
+And by another, in deep dell below,
+See, through the trees, a little river go
+All in its mid-day gold and glimmering.
+Honey from out the gnarled hive I'll bring,
+And apples, wan with sweetness, gather thee,--
+Cresses that grow where no man may them see,
+And sorrel untorn by the dew-claw'd stag:
+Pipes will I fashion of the syrinx flag,
+That thou mayst always know whither I roam,
+When it shall please thee in our quiet home
+To listen and think of love. Still let me speak;
+Still let me dive into the joy I seek,--
+For yet the past doth prison me. The rill,
+Thou haply mayst delight in, will I fill
+With fairy fishes from the mountain tarn,
+And thou shalt feed them from the squirrel's barn.
+Its bottom will I strew with amber shells,
+And pebbles blue from deep enchanted wells.
+Its sides I'll plant with dew-sweet eglantine,
+And honeysuckles full of clear bee-wine.
+I will entice this crystal rill to trace
+Love's silver name upon the meadow's face.
+I'll kneel to Vesta, for a flame of fire;
+And to god Phoebus, for a golden lyre;
+To Empress Dian, for a hunting spear;
+To Vesper, for a taper silver-clear,
+That I may see thy beauty through the night;
+To Flora, and a nightingale shall light
+Tame on thy finger; to the River-gods,
+And they shall bring thee taper fishing-rods
+Of gold, and lines of Naiads' long bright tress.
+Heaven shield thee for thine utter loveliness!
+Thy mossy footstool shall the altar be
+'Fore which I'll bend, bending, dear love, to thee:
+Those lips shall be my Delphos, and shall speak
+Laws to my footsteps, colour to my cheek,
+Trembling or stedfastness to this same voice,
+And of three sweetest pleasurings the choice:
+And that affectionate light, those diamond things,
+Those eyes, those passions, those supreme pearl springs,
+Shall be my grief, or twinkle me to pleasure.
+Say, is not bliss within our perfect seisure?
+O that I could not doubt?"
+The mountaineer
+Thus strove by fancies vain and crude to clear
+His briar'd path to some tranquillity.
+It gave bright gladness to his lady's eye,
+And yet the tears she wept were tears of sorrow;
+Answering thus, just as the golden morrow
+Beam'd upward from the vallies of the east:
+"O that the flutter of this heart had ceas'd,
+Or the sweet name of love had pass'd away.
+Young feather'd tyrant! by a swift decay
+Wilt thou devote this body to the earth:
+And I do think that at my very birth
+I lisp'd thy blooming titles inwardly;
+For at the first, first dawn and thought of thee,
+With uplift hands I blest the stars of heaven.
+Art thou not cruel? Ever have I striven
+To think thee kind, but ah, it will not do!
+When yet a child, I heard that kisses drew
+Favour from thee, and so I kisses gave
+To the void air, bidding them find out love:
+But when I came to feel how far above
+All fancy, pride, and fickle maidenhood,
+All earthly pleasure, all imagin'd good,
+Was the warm tremble of a devout kiss,--
+Even then, that moment, at the thought of this,
+Fainting I fell into a bed of flowers,
+And languish'd there three days. Ye milder powers,
+Am I not cruelly wrong'd? Believe, believe
+Me, dear Endymion, were I to weave
+With my own fancies garlands of sweet life,
+Thou shouldst be one of all. Ah, bitter strife!
+I may not be thy love: I am forbidden--
+Indeed I am--thwarted, affrighted, chidden,
+By things I trembled at, and gorgon wrath.
+Twice hast thou ask'd whither I went: henceforth
+Ask me no more! I may not utter it,
+Nor may I be thy love. We might commit
+Ourselves at once to vengeance; we might die;
+We might embrace and die: voluptuous thought!
+Enlarge not to my hunger, or I'm caught
+In trammels of perverse deliciousness.
+No, no, that shall not be: thee will I bless,
+And bid a long adieu."
+The Carian
+No word return'd: both lovelorn, silent, wan,
+Into the vallies green together went.
+Far wandering, they were perforce content
+To sit beneath a fair lone beechen tree;
+Nor at each other gaz'd, but heavily
+Por'd on its hazle cirque of shedded leaves.
+Endymion! unhappy! it nigh grieves
+Me to behold thee thus in last extreme:
+Ensky'd ere this, but truly that I deem
+Truth the best music in a first-born song.
+Thy lute-voic'd brother will I sing ere long,
+And thou shalt aid--hast thou not aided me?
+Yes, moonlight Emperor! felicity
+Has been thy meed for many thousand years;
+Yet often have I, on the brink of tears,
+Mourn'd as if yet thou wert a forester,--
+Forgetting the old tale.
+He did not stir
+His eyes from the dead leaves, or one small pulse
+Of joy he might have felt. The spirit culls
+Unfaded amaranth, when wild it strays
+Through the old garden-ground of boyish days.
+A little onward ran the very stream
+By which he took his first soft poppy dream;
+And on the very bark 'gainst which he leant
+A crescent he had carv'd, and round it spent
+His skill in little stars. The teeming tree
+Had swollen and green'd the pious charactery,
+But not ta'en out. Why, there was not a slope
+Up which he had not fear'd the antelope;
+And not a tree, beneath whose rooty shade
+He had not with his tamed leopards play'd.
+Nor could an arrow light, or javelin,
+Fly in the air where his had never been--
+And yet he knew it not.
+O treachery!
+Why does his lady smile, pleasing her eye
+With all his sorrowing? He sees her not.
+But who so stares on him? His sister sure!
+Peona of the woods!--Can she endure--
+Impossible--how dearly they embrace!
+His lady smiles; delight is in her face;
+It is no treachery.
+"Dear brother mine!
+Endymion, weep not so! Why shouldst thou pine
+When all great Latmos so exalt wilt be?
+Thank the great gods, and look not bitterly;
+And speak not one pale word, and sigh no more.
+Sure I will not believe thou hast such store
+Of grief, to last thee to my kiss again.
+Thou surely canst not bear a mind in pain,
+Come hand in hand with one so beautiful.
+Be happy both of you! for I will pull
+The flowers of autumn for your coronals.
+Pan's holy priest for young Endymion calls;
+And when he is restor'd, thou, fairest dame,
+Shalt be our queen. Now, is it not a shame
+To see ye thus,--not very, very sad?
+Perhaps ye are too happy to be glad:
+O feel as if it were a common day;
+Free-voic'd as one who never was away.
+No tongue shall ask, whence come ye? but ye shall
+Be gods of your own rest imperial.
+Not even I, for one whole month, will pry
+Into the hours that have pass'd us by,
+Since in my arbour I did sing to thee.
+O Hermes! on this very night will be
+A hymning up to Cynthia, queen of light;
+For the soothsayers old saw yesternight
+Good visions in the air,--whence will befal,
+As say these sages, health perpetual
+To shepherds and their flocks; and furthermore,
+In Dian's face they read the gentle lore:
+Therefore for her these vesper-carols are.
+Our friends will all be there from nigh and far.
+Many upon thy death have ditties made;
+And many, even now, their foreheads shade
+With cypress, on a day of sacrifice.
+New singing for our maids shalt thou devise,
+And pluck the sorrow from our huntsmen's brows.
+Tell me, my lady-queen, how to espouse
+This wayward brother to his rightful joys!
+His eyes are on thee bent, as thou didst poise
+His fate most goddess-like. Help me, I pray,
+To lure--Endymion, dear brother, say
+What ails thee?" He could bear no more, and so
+Bent his soul fiercely like a spiritual bow,
+And twang'd it inwardly, and calmly said:
+"I would have thee my only friend, sweet maid!
+My only visitor! not ignorant though,
+That those deceptions which for pleasure go
+'Mong men, are pleasures real as real may be:
+But there are higher ones I may not see,
+If impiously an earthly realm I take.
+Since I saw thee, I have been wide awake
+Night after night, and day by day, until
+Of the empyrean I have drunk my fill.
+Let it content thee, Sister, seeing me
+More happy than betides mortality.
+A hermit young, I'll live in mossy cave,
+Where thou alone shalt come to me, and lave
+Thy spirit in the wonders I shall tell.
+Through me the shepherd realm shall prosper well;
+For to thy tongue will I all health confide.
+And, for my sake, let this young maid abide
+With thee as a dear sister. Thou alone,
+Peona, mayst return to me. I own
+This may sound strangely: but when, dearest girl,
+Thou seest it for my happiness, no pearl
+Will trespass down those cheeks. Companion fair!
+Wilt be content to dwell with her, to share
+This sister's love with me?" Like one resign'd
+And bent by circumstance, and thereby blind
+In self-commitment, thus that meek unknown:
+"Aye, but a buzzing by my ears has flown,
+Of jubilee to Dian:--truth I heard!
+Well then, I see there is no little bird,
+Tender soever, but is Jove's own care.
+Long have I sought for rest, and, unaware,
+Behold I find it! so exalted too!
+So after my own heart! I knew, I knew
+There was a place untenanted in it:
+In that same void white Chastity shall sit,
+And monitor me nightly to lone slumber.
+With sanest lips I vow me to the number
+Of Dian's sisterhood; and, kind lady,
+With thy good help, this very night shall see
+My future days to her fane consecrate."
+As feels a dreamer what doth most create
+His own particular fright, so these three felt:
+Or like one who, in after ages, knelt
+To Lucifer or Baal, when he'd pine
+After a little sleep: or when in mine
+Far under-ground, a sleeper meets his friends
+Who know him not. Each diligently bends
+Towards common thoughts and things for very fear;
+Striving their ghastly malady to cheer,
+By thinking it a thing of yes and no,
+That housewives talk of. But the spirit-blow
+Was struck, and all were dreamers. At the last
+Endymion said: "Are not our fates all cast?
+Why stand we here? Adieu, ye tender pair!
+Adieu!" Whereat those maidens, with wild stare,
+Walk'd dizzily away. Pained and hot
+His eyes went after them, until they got
+Near to a cypress grove, whose deadly maw,
+In one swift moment, would what then he saw
+Engulph for ever. "Stay!" he cried, "ah, stay!
+Turn, damsels! hist! one word I have to say.
+Sweet Indian, I would see thee once again.
+It is a thing I dote on: so I'd fain,
+Peona, ye should hand in hand repair
+Into those holy groves, that silent are
+Behind great Dian's temple. I'll be yon,
+At vesper's earliest twinkle--they are gone--
+But once, once, once again--" At this he press'd
+His hands against his face, and then did rest
+His head upon a mossy hillock green,
+And so remain'd as he a corpse had been
+All the long day; save when he scantly lifted
+His eyes abroad, to see how shadows shifted
+With the slow move of time,--sluggish and weary
+Until the poplar tops, in journey dreary,
+Had reach'd the river's brim. Then up he rose,
+And, slowly as that very river flows,
+Walk'd towards the temple grove with this lament:
+"Why such a golden eve? The breeze is sent
+Careful and soft, that not a leaf may fall
+Before the serene father of them all
+Bows down his summer head below the west.
+Now am I of breath, speech, and speed possest,
+But at the setting I must bid adieu
+To her for the last time. Night will strew
+On the damp grass myriads of lingering leaves,
+And with them shall I die; nor much it grieves
+To die, when summer dies on the cold sward.
+Why, I have been a butterfly, a lord
+Of flowers, garlands, love-knots, silly posies,
+Groves, meadows, melodies, and arbour roses;
+My kingdom's at its death, and just it is
+That I should die with it: so in all this
+We miscal grief, bale, sorrow, heartbreak, woe,
+What is there to plain of? By Titan's foe
+I am but rightly serv'd." So saying, he
+Tripp'd lightly on, in sort of deathful glee;
+Laughing at the clear stream and setting sun,
+As though they jests had been: nor had he done
+His laugh at nature's holy countenance,
+Until that grove appear'd, as if perchance,
+And then his tongue with sober seemlihed
+Gave utterance as he entered: "Ha!" I said,
+"King of the butterflies; but by this gloom,
+And by old Rhadamanthus' tongue of doom,
+This dusk religion, pomp of solitude,
+And the Promethean clay by thief endued,
+By old Saturnus' forelock, by his head
+Shook with eternal palsy, I did wed
+Myself to things of light from infancy;
+And thus to be cast out, thus lorn to die,
+Is sure enough to make a mortal man
+Grow impious." So he inwardly began
+On things for which no wording can be found;
+Deeper and deeper sinking, until drown'd
+Beyond the reach of music: for the choir
+Of Cynthia he heard not, though rough briar
+Nor muffling thicket interpos'd to dull
+The vesper hymn, far swollen, soft and full,
+Through the dark pillars of those sylvan aisles.
+He saw not the two maidens, nor their smiles,
+Wan as primroses gather'd at midnight
+By chilly finger'd spring. "Unhappy wight!
+Endymion!" said Peona, "we are here!
+What wouldst thou ere we all are laid on bier?"
+Then he embrac'd her, and his lady's hand
+Press'd, saying:" Sister, I would have command,
+If it were heaven's will, on our sad fate."
+At which that dark-eyed stranger stood elate
+And said, in a new voice, but sweet as love,
+To Endymion's amaze: "By Cupid's dove,
+And so thou shalt! and by the lily truth
+Of my own breast thou shalt, beloved youth!"
+And as she spake, into her face there came
+Light, as reflected from a silver flame:
+Her long black hair swell'd ampler, in display
+Full golden; in her eyes a brighter day
+Dawn'd blue and full of love. Aye, he beheld
+Phoebe, his passion! joyous she upheld
+Her lucid bow, continuing thus; "Drear, drear
+Has our delaying been; but foolish fear
+Withheld me first; and then decrees of fate;
+And then 'twas fit that from this mortal state
+Thou shouldst, my love, by some unlook'd for change
+Be spiritualiz'd. Peona, we shall range
+These forests, and to thee they safe shall be
+As was thy cradle; hither shalt thou flee
+To meet us many a time." Next Cynthia bright
+Peona kiss'd, and bless'd with fair good night:
+Her brother kiss'd her too, and knelt adown
+Before his goddess, in a blissful swoon.
+She gave her fair hands to him, and behold,
+Before three swiftest kisses he had told,
+They vanish'd far away!--Peona went
+Home through the gloomy wood in wonderment.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	42. A Dream, After Reading Dante's Episode Of Paolo And Francesca	|	<poem>
+As Hermes once took to his feathers light,
+When lulled Argus, baffled, swooned and slept,
+So on a Delphic reed, my idle spright
+So played, so charmed, so conquered, so bereft
+The dragon-world of all its hundred eyes;
+And seeing it asleep, so fled away,
+Not to pure Ida with its snow-cold skies,
+Nor unto Tempe, where Jove grieved a day;
+But to that second circle of sad Hell,
+Where in the gust, the whirlwind, and the flaw
+Of rain and hail-stones, lovers need not tell
+Their sorrows. Pale were the sweet lips I saw,
+Pale were the lips I kissed, and fair the form
+I floated with, about that melancholy storm.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	43. Meg Merrilies	|	<poem>
+Old Meg she was a Gipsy,
+And liv'd upon the Moors:
+Her bed it was the brown heath turf,
+And her house was out of doors.
+Her apples were swart blackberries,
+Her currants pods o' broom;
+Her wine was dew of the wild white rose,
+Her book a churchyard tomb.
+Her Brothers were the craggy hills,
+Her Sisters larchen trees--
+Alone with her great family
+She liv'd as she did please.
+No breakfast had she many a morn,
+No dinner many a noon,
+And 'stead of supper she would stare
+Full hard against the Moon.
+But every morn of woodbine fresh
+She made her garlanding,
+And every night the dark glen Yew
+She wove, and she would sing.
+And with her fingers old and brown
+She plaited Mats o' Rushes,
+And gave them to the Cottagers
+She met among the Bushes.
+Old Meg was brave as Margaret Queen
+And tall as Amazon:
+An old red blanket cloak she wore;
+A chip hat had she on.
+God rest her aged bones somewhere--
+She died full long agone!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	44. Think Of It Not, Sweet One	|	<poem>
+Think not of it, sweet one, so;---
+Give it not a tear;
+Sigh thou mayst, and bid it go
+Any---anywhere.
+Do not lool so sad, sweet one,---
+Sad and fadingly;
+Shed one drop then,---it is gone---
+O 'twas born to die!
+Still so pale? then, dearest, weep;
+Weep, I'll count the tears,
+And each one shall be a bliss
+For thee in after years.
+Brighter has it left thine eyes
+Than a sunny rill;
+And thy whispering melodies
+Are tenderer still.
+Yet---as all things mourn awhile
+At fleeting blisses,
+E'en let us too! but be our dirge
+A dirge of kisses.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	45. Ode To Autumn	|	<poem>
+Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
+Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
+Conspiring with him how to load and bless
+With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
+To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
+And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
+To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
+With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
+And still more, later flowers for the bees,
+Until they think warm days will never cease,
+For Summer has o'er-brimmed their clammy cell.
+Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
+Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
+Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
+Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
+Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
+Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
+Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;
+And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
+Steady thy laden head across a brook;
+Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
+Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.
+Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
+Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,---
+While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
+And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
+Then in a wailful choir, the small gnats mourn
+Among the river sallows, borne aloft
+Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
+And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
+Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
+The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
+And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	46. To The Nile	|	<poem>
+Son of the old Moon-mountains African!
+Chief of the Pyramid and Crocodile!
+We call thee fruitful, and that very while
+A desert fills our seeing's inward span:
+Nurse of swart nations since the world began,
+Art thou so fruitful? or dost thou beguile
+Such men to honour thee, who, worn with toil,
+Rest for a space 'twixt Cairo and Decan?
+O may dark fancies err! They surely do;
+'Tis ignorance that makes a barren waste
+Of all beyond itself. Thou dost bedew
+Green rushes like our rivers, and dost taste
+The pleasant sunrise. Green isles hast thou too,
+And to the sea as happily dost haste.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	47. Endymion: Book III	|	<poem>
+There are who lord it o'er their fellow-men
+With most prevailing tinsel: who unpen
+Their baaing vanities, to browse away
+The comfortable green and juicy hay
+From human pastures; or, O torturing fact!
+Who, through an idiot blink, will see unpack'd
+Fire-branded foxes to sear up and singe
+Our gold and ripe-ear'd hopes. With not one tinge
+Of sanctuary splendour, not a sight
+Able to face an owl's, they still are dight
+By the blear-eyed nations in empurpled vests,
+And crowns, and turbans. With unladen breasts,
+Save of blown self-applause, they proudly mount
+To their spirit's perch, their being's high account,
+Their tiptop nothings, their dull skies, their thrones--
+Amid the fierce intoxicating tones
+Of trumpets, shoutings, and belabour'd drums,
+And sudden cannon. Ah! how all this hums,
+In wakeful ears, like uproar past and gone--
+Like thunder clouds that spake to Babylon,
+And set those old Chaldeans to their tasks.--
+Are then regalities all gilded masks?
+No, there are throned seats unscalable
+But by a patient wing, a constant spell,
+Or by ethereal things that, unconfin'd,
+Can make a ladder of the eternal wind,
+And poise about in cloudy thunder-tents
+To watch the abysm-birth of elements.
+Aye, 'bove the withering of old-lipp'd Fate
+A thousand Powers keep religious state,
+In water, fiery realm, and airy bourne;
+And, silent as a consecrated urn,
+Hold sphery sessions for a season due.
+Yet few of these far majesties, ah, few!
+Have bared their operations to this globe--
+Few, who with gorgeous pageantry enrobe
+Our piece of heaven--whose benevolence
+Shakes hand with our own Ceres; every sense
+Filling with spiritual sweets to plenitude,
+As bees gorge full their cells. And, by the feud
+'Twixt Nothing and Creation, I here swear,
+Eterne Apollo! that thy Sister fair
+Is of all these the gentlier-mightiest.
+When thy gold breath is misting in the west,
+She unobserved steals unto her throne,
+And there she sits most meek and most alone;
+As if she had not pomp subservient;
+As if thine eye, high Poet! was not bent
+Towards her with the Muses in thine heart;
+As if the ministring stars kept not apart,
+Waiting for silver-footed messages.
+O Moon! the oldest shades 'mong oldest trees
+Feel palpitations when thou lookest in:
+O Moon! old boughs lisp forth a holier din
+The while they feel thine airy fellowship.
+Thou dost bless every where, with silver lip
+Kissing dead things to life. The sleeping kine,
+Couched in thy brightness, dream of fields divine:
+Innumerable mountains rise, and rise,
+Ambitious for the hallowing of thine eyes;
+And yet thy benediction passeth not
+One obscure hiding-place, one little spot
+Where pleasure may be sent: the nested wren
+Has thy fair face within its tranquil ken,
+And from beneath a sheltering ivy leaf
+Takes glimpses of thee; thou art a relief
+To the poor patient oyster, where it sleeps
+Within its pearly house.--The mighty deeps,
+The monstrous sea is thine--the myriad sea!
+O Moon! far-spooming Ocean bows to thee,
+And Tellus feels his forehead's cumbrous load.
+Cynthia! where art thou now? What far abode
+Of green or silvery bower doth enshrine
+Such utmost beauty? Alas, thou dost pine
+For one as sorrowful: thy cheek is pale
+For one whose cheek is pale: thou dost bewail
+His tears, who weeps for thee. Where dost thou sigh?
+Ah! surely that light peeps from Vesper's eye,
+Or what a thing is love! 'Tis She, but lo!
+How chang'd, how full of ache, how gone in woe!
+She dies at the thinnest cloud; her loveliness
+Is wan on Neptune's blue: yet there's a stress
+Of love-spangles, just off yon cape of trees,
+Dancing upon the waves, as if to please
+The curly foam with amorous influence.
+O, not so idle: for down-glancing thence
+She fathoms eddies, and runs wild about
+O'erwhelming water-courses; scaring out
+The thorny sharks from hiding-holes, and fright'ning
+Their savage eyes with unaccustomed lightning.
+Where will the splendor be content to reach?
+O love! how potent hast thou been to teach
+Strange journeyings! Wherever beauty dwells,
+In gulf or aerie, mountains or deep dells,
+In light, in gloom, in star or blazing sun,
+Thou pointest out the way, and straight 'tis won.
+Amid his toil thou gav'st Leander breath;
+Thou leddest Orpheus through the gleams of death;
+Thou madest Pluto bear thin element;
+And now, O winged Chieftain! thou hast sent
+A moon-beam to the deep, deep water-world,
+To find Endymion.
+On gold sand impearl'd
+With lily shells, and pebbles milky white,
+Poor Cynthia greeted him, and sooth'd her light
+Against his pallid face: he felt the charm
+To breathlessness, and suddenly a warm
+Of his heart's blood: 'twas very sweet; he stay'd
+His wandering steps, and half-entranced laid
+His head upon a tuft of straggling weeds,
+To taste the gentle moon, and freshening beads,
+Lashed from the crystal roof by fishes' tails.
+And so he kept, until the rosy veils
+Mantling the east, by Aurora's peering hand
+Were lifted from the water's breast, and fann'd
+Into sweet air; and sober'd morning came
+Meekly through billows:--when like taper-flame
+Left sudden by a dallying breath of air,
+He rose in silence, and once more 'gan fare
+Along his fated way.
+Far had he roam'd,
+With nothing save the hollow vast, that foam'd
+Above, around, and at his feet; save things
+More dead than Morpheus' imaginings:
+Old rusted anchors, helmets, breast-plates large
+Of gone sea-warriors; brazen beaks and targe;
+Rudders that for a hundred years had lost
+The sway of human hand; gold vase emboss'd
+With long-forgotten story, and wherein
+No reveller had ever dipp'd a chin
+But those of Saturn's vintage; mouldering scrolls,
+Writ in the tongue of heaven, by those souls
+Who first were on the earth; and sculptures rude
+In ponderous stone, developing the mood
+Of ancient Nox;--then skeletons of man,
+Of beast, behemoth, and leviathan,
+And elephant, and eagle, and huge jaw
+Of nameless monster. A cold leaden awe
+These secrets struck into him; and unless
+Dian had chaced away that heaviness,
+He might have died: but now, with cheered feel,
+He onward kept; wooing these thoughts to steal
+About the labyrinth in his soul of love.
+"What is there in thee, Moon! that thou shouldst move
+My heart so potently? When yet a child
+I oft have dried my tears when thou hast smil'd.
+Thou seem'dst my sister: hand in hand we went
+From eve to morn across the firmament.
+No apples would I gather from the tree,
+Till thou hadst cool'd their cheeks deliciously:
+No tumbling water ever spake romance,
+But when my eyes with thine thereon could dance:
+No woods were green enough, no bower divine,
+Until thou liftedst up thine eyelids fine:
+In sowing time ne'er would I dibble take,
+Or drop a seed, till thou wast wide awake;
+And, in the summer tide of blossoming,
+No one but thee hath heard me blithly sing
+And mesh my dewy flowers all the night.
+No melody was like a passing spright
+If it went not to solemnize thy reign.
+Yes, in my boyhood, every joy and pain
+By thee were fashion'd to the self-same end;
+And as I grew in years, still didst thou blend
+With all my ardours: thou wast the deep glen;
+Thou wast the mountain-top--the sage's pen--
+The poet's harp--the voice of friends--the sun;
+Thou wast the river--thou wast glory won;
+Thou wast my clarion's blast--thou wast my steed--
+My goblet full of wine--my topmost deed:--
+Thou wast the charm of women, lovely Moon!
+O what a wild and harmonized tune
+My spirit struck from all the beautiful!
+On some bright essence could I lean, and lull
+Myself to immortality: I prest
+Nature's soft pillow in a wakeful rest.
+But, gentle Orb! there came a nearer bliss--
+My strange love came--Felicity's abyss!
+She came, and thou didst fade, and fade away--
+Yet not entirely; no, thy starry sway
+Has been an under-passion to this hour.
+Now I begin to feel thine orby power
+Is coming fresh upon me: O be kind,
+Keep back thine influence, and do not blind
+My sovereign vision.--Dearest love, forgive
+That I can think away from thee and live!--
+Pardon me, airy planet, that I prize
+One thought beyond thine argent luxuries!
+How far beyond!" At this a surpris'd start
+Frosted the springing verdure of his heart;
+For as he lifted up his eyes to swear
+How his own goddess was past all things fair,
+He saw far in the concave green of the sea
+An old man sitting calm and peacefully.
+Upon a weeded rock this old man sat,
+And his white hair was awful, and a mat
+Of weeds were cold beneath his cold thin feet;
+And, ample as the largest winding-sheet,
+A cloak of blue wrapp'd up his aged bones,
+O'erwrought with symbols by the deepest groans
+Of ambitious magic: every ocean-form
+Was woven in with black distinctness; storm,
+And calm, and whispering, and hideous roar
+Were emblem'd in the woof; with every shape
+That skims, or dives, or sleeps, 'twixt cape and cape.
+The gulphing whale was like a dot in the spell,
+Yet look upon it, and 'twould size and swell
+To its huge self; and the minutest fish
+Would pass the very hardest gazer's wish,
+And show his little eye's anatomy.
+Then there was pictur'd the regality
+Of Neptune; and the sea nymphs round his state,
+In beauteous vassalage, look up and wait.
+Beside this old man lay a pearly wand,
+And in his lap a book, the which he conn'd
+So stedfastly, that the new denizen
+Had time to keep him in amazed ken,
+To mark these shadowings, and stand in awe.
+The old man rais'd his hoary head and saw
+The wilder'd stranger--seeming not to see,
+His features were so lifeless. Suddenly
+He woke as from a trance; his snow-white brows
+Went arching up, and like two magic ploughs
+Furrow'd deep wrinkles in his forehead large,
+Which kept as fixedly as rocky marge,
+Till round his wither'd lips had gone a smile.
+Then up he rose, like one whose tedious toil
+Had watch'd for years in forlorn hermitage,
+Who had not from mid-life to utmost age
+Eas'd in one accent his o'er-burden'd soul,
+Even to the trees. He rose: he grasp'd his stole,
+With convuls'd clenches waving it abroad,
+And in a voice of solemn joy, that aw'd
+Echo into oblivion, he said:--
+"Thou art the man! Now shall I lay my head
+In peace upon my watery pillow: now
+Sleep will come smoothly to my weary brow.
+O Jove! I shall be young again, be young!
+O shell-borne Neptune, I am pierc'd and stung
+With new-born life! What shall I do? Where go,
+When I have cast this serpent-skin of woe?--
+I'll swim to the syrens, and one moment listen
+Their melodies, and see their long hair glisten;
+Anon upon that giant's arm I'll be,
+That writhes about the roots of Sicily:
+To northern seas I'll in a twinkling sail,
+And mount upon the snortings of a whale
+To some black cloud; thence down I'll madly sweep
+On forked lightning, to the deepest deep,
+Where through some sucking pool I will be hurl'd
+With rapture to the other side of the world!
+O, I am full of gladness! Sisters three,
+I bow full hearted to your old decree!
+Yes, every god be thank'd, and power benign,
+For I no more shall wither, droop, and pine.
+Thou art the man!" Endymion started back
+Dismay'd; and, like a wretch from whom the rack
+Tortures hot breath, and speech of agony,
+Mutter'd: "What lonely death am I to die
+In this cold region? Will he let me freeze,
+And float my brittle limbs o'er polar seas?
+Or will he touch me with his searing hand,
+And leave a black memorial on the sand?
+Or tear me piece-meal with a bony saw,
+And keep me as a chosen food to draw
+His magian fish through hated fire and flame?
+O misery of hell! resistless, tame,
+Am I to be burnt up? No, I will shout,
+Until the gods through heaven's blue look out!--
+O Tartarus! but some few days agone
+Her soft arms were entwining me, and on
+Her voice I hung like fruit among green leaves:
+Her lips were all my own, and--ah, ripe sheaves
+Of happiness! ye on the stubble droop,
+But never may be garner'd. I must stoop
+My head, and kiss death's foot. Love! love, farewel!
+Is there no hope from thee? This horrid spell
+Would melt at thy sweet breath.--By Dian's hind
+Feeding from her white fingers, on the wind
+I see thy streaming hair! and now, by Pan,
+I care not for this old mysterious man!"
+He spake, and walking to that aged form,
+Look'd high defiance. Lo! his heart 'gan warm
+With pity, for the grey-hair'd creature wept.
+Had he then wrong'd a heart where sorrow kept?
+Had he, though blindly contumelious, brought
+Rheum to kind eyes, a sting to human thought,
+Convulsion to a mouth of many years?
+He had in truth; and he was ripe for tears.
+The penitent shower fell, as down he knelt
+Before that care-worn sage, who trembling felt
+About his large dark locks, and faultering spake:
+"Arise, good youth, for sacred Phoebus' sake!
+I know thine inmost bosom, and I feel
+A very brother's yearning for thee steal
+Into mine own: for why? thou openest
+The prison gates that have so long opprest
+My weary watching. Though thou know'st it not,
+Thou art commission'd to this fated spot
+For great enfranchisement. O weep no more;
+I am a friend to love, to loves of yore:
+Aye, hadst thou never lov'd an unknown power
+I had been grieving at this joyous hour
+But even now most miserable old,
+I saw thee, and my blood no longer cold
+Gave mighty pulses: in this tottering case
+Grew a new heart, which at this moment plays
+As dancingly as thine. Be not afraid,
+For thou shalt hear this secret all display'd,
+Now as we speed towards our joyous task."
+So saying, this young soul in age's mask
+Went forward with the Carian side by side:
+Resuming quickly thus; while ocean's tide
+Hung swollen at their backs, and jewel'd sands
+Took silently their foot-prints. "My soul stands
+Now past the midway from mortality,
+And so I can prepare without a sigh
+To tell thee briefly all my joy and pain.
+I was a fisher once, upon this main,
+And my boat danc'd in every creek and bay;
+Rough billows were my home by night and day,--
+The sea-gulls not more constant; for I had
+No housing from the storm and tempests mad,
+But hollow rocks,--and they were palaces
+Of silent happiness, of slumberous ease:
+Long years of misery have told me so.
+Aye, thus it was one thousand years ago.
+One thousand years!--Is it then possible
+To look so plainly through them? to dispel
+A thousand years with backward glance sublime?
+To breathe away as 'twere all scummy slime
+From off a crystal pool, to see its deep,
+And one's own image from the bottom peep?
+Yes: now I am no longer wretched thrall,
+My long captivity and moanings all
+Are but a slime, a thin-pervading scum,
+The which I breathe away, and thronging come
+Like things of yesterday my youthful pleasures.
+"I touch'd no lute, I sang not, trod no measures:
+I was a lonely youth on desert shores.
+My sports were lonely, 'mid continuous roars,
+And craggy isles, and sea-mew's plaintive cry
+Plaining discrepant between sea and sky.
+Dolphins were still my playmates; shapes unseen
+Would let me feel their scales of gold and green,
+Nor be my desolation; and, full oft,
+When a dread waterspout had rear'd aloft
+Its hungry hugeness, seeming ready ripe
+To burst with hoarsest thunderings, and wipe
+My life away like a vast sponge of fate,
+Some friendly monster, pitying my sad state,
+Has dived to its foundations, gulph'd it down,
+And left me tossing safely. But the crown
+Of all my life was utmost quietude:
+More did I love to lie in cavern rude,
+Keeping in wait whole days for Neptune's voice,
+And if it came at last, hark, and rejoice!
+There blush'd no summer eve but I would steer
+My skiff along green shelving coasts, to hear
+The shepherd's pipe come clear from aery steep,
+Mingled with ceaseless bleatings of his sheep:
+And never was a day of summer shine,
+But I beheld its birth upon the brine:
+For I would watch all night to see unfold
+Heaven's gates, and Aethon snort his morning gold
+Wide o'er the swelling streams: and constantly
+At brim of day-tide, on some grassy lea,
+My nets would be spread out, and I at rest.
+The poor folk of the sea-country I blest
+With daily boon of fish most delicate:
+They knew not whence this bounty, and elate
+Would strew sweet flowers on a sterile beach.
+"Why was I not contented? Wherefore reach
+At things which, but for thee, O Latmian!
+Had been my dreary death? Fool! I began
+To feel distemper'd longings: to desire
+The utmost privilege that ocean's sire
+Could grant in benediction: to be free
+Of all his kingdom. Long in misery
+I wasted, ere in one extremest fit
+I plung'd for life or death. To interknit
+One's senses with so dense a breathing stuff
+Might seem a work of pain; so not enough
+Can I admire how crystal-smooth it felt,
+And buoyant round my limbs. At first I dwelt
+Whole days and days in sheer astonishment;
+Forgetful utterly of self-intent;
+Moving but with the mighty ebb and flow.
+Then, like a new fledg'd bird that first doth shew
+His spreaded feathers to the morrow chill,
+I tried in fear the pinions of my will.
+'Twas freedom! and at once I visited
+The ceaseless wonders of this ocean-bed.
+No need to tell thee of them, for I see
+That thou hast been a witness--it must be
+For these I know thou canst not feel a drouth,
+By the melancholy corners of that mouth.
+So I will in my story straightway pass
+To more immediate matter. Woe, alas!
+That love should be my bane! Ah, Scylla fair!
+Why did poor Glaucus ever--ever dare
+To sue thee to his heart? Kind stranger-youth!
+I lov'd her to the very white of truth,
+And she would not conceive it. Timid thing!
+She fled me swift as sea-bird on the wing,
+Round every isle, and point, and promontory,
+From where large Hercules wound up his story
+Far as Egyptian Nile. My passion grew
+The more, the more I saw her dainty hue
+Gleam delicately through the azure clear:
+Until 'twas too fierce agony to bear;
+And in that agony, across my grief
+It flash'd, that Circe might find some relief--
+Cruel enchantress! So above the water
+I rear'd my head, and look'd for Phoebus' daughter.
+Aeaea's isle was wondering at the moon:--
+It seem'd to whirl around me, and a swoon
+Left me dead-drifting to that fatal power.
+"When I awoke, 'twas in a twilight bower;
+Just when the light of morn, with hum of bees,
+Stole through its verdurous matting of fresh trees.
+How sweet, and sweeter! for I heard a lyre,
+And over it a sighing voice expire.
+It ceased--I caught light footsteps; and anon
+The fairest face that morn e'er look'd upon
+Push'd through a screen of roses. Starry Jove!
+With tears, and smiles, and honey-words she wove
+A net whose thraldom was more bliss than all
+The range of flower'd Elysium. Thus did fall
+The dew of her rich speech: "Ah! Art awake?
+O let me hear thee speak, for Cupid's sake!
+I am so oppress'd with joy! Why, I have shed
+An urn of tears, as though thou wert cold dead;
+And now I find thee living, I will pour
+From these devoted eyes their silver store,
+Until exhausted of the latest drop,
+So it will pleasure thee, and force thee stop
+Here, that I too may live: but if beyond
+Such cool and sorrowful offerings, thou art fond
+Of soothing warmth, of dalliance supreme;
+If thou art ripe to taste a long love dream;
+If smiles, if dimples, tongues for ardour mute,
+Hang in thy vision like a tempting fruit,
+O let me pluck it for thee." Thus she link'd
+Her charming syllables, till indistinct
+Their music came to my o'er-sweeten'd soul;
+And then she hover'd over me, and stole
+So near, that if no nearer it had been
+This furrow'd visage thou hadst never seen.
+"Young man of Latmos! thus particular
+Am I, that thou may'st plainly see how far
+This fierce temptation went: and thou may'st not
+Exclaim, How then, was Scylla quite forgot?
+"Who could resist? Who in this universe?
+She did so breathe ambrosia; so immerse
+My fine existence in a golden clime.
+She took me like a child of suckling time,
+And cradled me in roses. Thus condemn'd,
+The current of my former life was stemm'd,
+And to this arbitrary queen of sense
+I bow'd a tranced vassal: nor would thence
+Have mov'd, even though Amphion's harp had woo'd
+Me back to Scylla o'er the billows rude.
+For as Apollo each eve doth devise
+A new appareling for western skies;
+So every eve, nay every spendthrift hour
+Shed balmy consciousness within that bower.
+And I was free of haunts umbrageous;
+Could wander in the mazy forest-house
+Of squirrels, foxes shy, and antler'd deer,
+And birds from coverts innermost and drear
+Warbling for very joy mellifluous sorrow--
+To me new born delights!
+"Now let me borrow,
+For moments few, a temperament as stern
+As Pluto's sceptre, that my words not burn
+These uttering lips, while I in calm speech tell
+How specious heaven was changed to real hell.
+"One morn she left me sleeping: half awake
+I sought for her smooth arms and lips, to slake
+My greedy thirst with nectarous camel-draughts;
+But she was gone. Whereat the barbed shafts
+Of disappointment stuck in me so sore,
+That out I ran and search'd the forest o'er.
+Wandering about in pine and cedar gloom
+Damp awe assail'd me; for there 'gan to boom
+A sound of moan, an agony of sound,
+Sepulchral from the distance all around.
+Then came a conquering earth-thunder, and rumbled
+That fierce complain to silence: while I stumbled
+Down a precipitous path, as if impell'd.
+I came to a dark valley.--Groanings swell'd
+Poisonous about my ears, and louder grew,
+The nearer I approach'd a flame's gaunt blue,
+That glar'd before me through a thorny brake.
+This fire, like the eye of gordian snake,
+Bewitch'd me towards; and I soon was near
+A sight too fearful for the feel of fear:
+In thicket hid I curs'd the haggard scene--
+The banquet of my arms, my arbour queen,
+Seated upon an uptorn forest root;
+And all around her shapes, wizard and brute,
+Laughing, and wailing, groveling, serpenting,
+Shewing tooth, tusk, and venom-bag, and sting!
+O such deformities! Old Charon's self,
+Should he give up awhile his penny pelf,
+And take a dream 'mong rushes Stygian,
+It could not be so phantasied. Fierce, wan,
+And tyrannizing was the lady's look,
+As over them a gnarled staff she shook.
+Oft-times upon the sudden she laugh'd out,
+And from a basket emptied to the rout
+Clusters of grapes, the which they raven'd quick
+And roar'd for more; with many a hungry lick
+About their shaggy jaws. Avenging, slow,
+Anon she took a branch of mistletoe,
+And emptied on't a black dull-gurgling phial:
+Groan'd one and all, as if some piercing trial
+Was sharpening for their pitiable bones.
+She lifted up the charm: appealing groans
+From their poor breasts went sueing to her ear
+In vain; remorseless as an infant's bier
+She whisk'd against their eyes the sooty oil.
+Whereat was heard a noise of painful toil,
+Increasing gradual to a tempest rage,
+Shrieks, yells, and groans of torture-pilgrimage;
+Until their grieved bodies 'gan to bloat
+And puff from the tail's end to stifled throat:
+Then was appalling silence: then a sight
+More wildering than all that hoarse affright;
+For the whole herd, as by a whirlwind writhen,
+Went through the dismal air like one huge Python
+Antagonizing Boreas,--and so vanish'd.
+Yet there was not a breath of wind: she banish'd
+These phantoms with a nod. Lo! from the dark
+Came waggish fauns, and nymphs, and satyrs stark,
+With dancing and loud revelry,--and went
+Swifter than centaurs after rapine bent.--
+Sighing an elephant appear'd and bow'd
+Before the fierce witch, speaking thus aloud
+In human accent: "Potent goddess! chief
+Of pains resistless! make my being brief,
+Or let me from this heavy prison fly:
+Or give me to the air, or let me die!
+I sue not for my happy crown again;
+I sue not for my phalanx on the plain;
+I sue not for my lone, my widow'd wife;
+I sue not for my ruddy drops of life,
+My children fair, my lovely girls and boys!
+I will forget them; I will pass these joys;
+Ask nought so heavenward, so too--too high:
+Only I pray, as fairest boon, to die,
+Or be deliver'd from this cumbrous flesh,
+From this gross, detestable, filthy mesh,
+And merely given to the cold bleak air.
+Have mercy, Goddess! Circe, feel my prayer!"
+That curst magician's name fell icy numb
+Upon my wild conjecturing: truth had come
+Naked and sabre-like against my heart.
+I saw a fury whetting a death-dart;
+And my slain spirit, overwrought with fright,
+Fainted away in that dark lair of night.
+Think, my deliverer, how desolate
+My waking must have been! disgust, and hate,
+And terrors manifold divided me
+A spoil amongst them. I prepar'd to flee
+Into the dungeon core of that wild wood:
+I fled three days--when lo! before me stood
+Glaring the angry witch. O Dis, even now,
+A clammy dew is beading on my brow,
+At mere remembering her pale laugh, and curse.
+"Ha! ha! Sir Dainty! there must be a nurse
+Made of rose leaves and thistledown, express,
+To cradle thee my sweet, and lull thee: yes,
+I am too flinty-hard for thy nice touch:
+My tenderest squeeze is but a giant's clutch.
+So, fairy-thing, it shall have lullabies
+Unheard of yet; and it shall still its cries
+Upon some breast more lily-feminine.
+Oh, no--it shall not pine, and pine, and pine
+More than one pretty, trifling thousand years;
+And then 'twere pity, but fate's gentle shears
+Cut short its immortality. Sea-flirt!
+Young dove of the waters! truly I'll not hurt
+One hair of thine: see how I weep and sigh,
+That our heart-broken parting is so nigh.
+And must we part? Ah, yes, it must be so.
+Yet ere thou leavest me in utter woe,
+Let me sob over thee my last adieus,
+And speak a blessing: Mark me! thou hast thews
+Immortal, for thou art of heavenly race:
+But such a love is mine, that here I chase
+Eternally away from thee all bloom
+Of youth, and destine thee towards a tomb.
+Hence shalt thou quickly to the watery vast;
+And there, ere many days be overpast,
+Disabled age shall seize thee; and even then
+Thou shalt not go the way of aged men;
+But live and wither, cripple and still breathe
+Ten hundred years: which gone, I then bequeath
+Thy fragile bones to unknown burial.
+Adieu, sweet love, adieu!"--As shot stars fall,
+She fled ere I could groan for mercy. Stung
+And poisoned was my spirit: despair sung
+A war-song of defiance 'gainst all hell.
+A hand was at my shoulder to compel
+My sullen steps; another 'fore my eyes
+Moved on with pointed finger. In this guise
+Enforced, at the last by ocean's foam
+I found me; by my fresh, my native home.
+Its tempering coolness, to my life akin,
+Came salutary as I waded in;
+And, with a blind voluptuous rage, I gave
+Battle to the swollen billow-ridge, and drave
+Large froth before me, while there yet remain'd
+Hale strength, nor from my bones all marrow drain'd.
+"Young lover, I must weep--such hellish spite
+With dry cheek who can tell? While thus my might
+Proving upon this element, dismay'd,
+Upon a dead thing's face my hand I laid;
+I look'd--'twas Scylla! Cursed, cursed Circe!
+O vulture-witch, hast never heard of mercy?
+Could not thy harshest vengeance be content,
+But thou must nip this tender innocent
+Because I lov'd her?--Cold, O cold indeed
+Were her fair limbs, and like a common weed
+The sea-swell took her hair. Dead as she was
+I clung about her waist, nor ceas'd to pass
+Fleet as an arrow through unfathom'd brine,
+Until there shone a fabric crystalline,
+Ribb'd and inlaid with coral, pebble, and pearl.
+Headlong I darted; at one eager swirl
+Gain'd its bright portal, enter'd, and behold!
+'Twas vast, and desolate, and icy-cold;
+And all around--But wherefore this to thee
+Who in few minutes more thyself shalt see?--
+I left poor Scylla in a niche and fled.
+My fever'd parchings up, my scathing dread
+Met palsy half way: soon these limbs became
+Gaunt, wither'd, sapless, feeble, cramp'd, and lame.
+"Now let me pass a cruel, cruel space,
+Without one hope, without one faintest trace
+Of mitigation, or redeeming bubble
+Of colour'd phantasy; for I fear 'twould trouble
+Thy brain to loss of reason: and next tell
+How a restoring chance came down to quell
+One half of the witch in me. On a day,
+Sitting upon a rock above the spray,
+I saw grow up from the horizon's brink
+A gallant vessel: soon she seem'd to sink
+Away from me again, as though her course
+Had been resum'd in spite of hindering force--
+So vanish'd: and not long, before arose
+Dark clouds, and muttering of winds morose.
+Old Eolus would stifle his mad spleen,
+But could not: therefore all the billows green
+Toss'd up the silver spume against the clouds.
+The tempest came: I saw that vessel's shrouds
+In perilous bustle; while upon the deck
+Stood trembling creatures. I beheld the wreck;
+The final gulphing; the poor struggling souls:
+I heard their cries amid loud thunder-rolls.
+O they had all been sav'd but crazed eld
+Annull'd my vigorous cravings: and thus quell'd
+And curb'd, think on't, O Latmian! did I sit
+Writhing with pity, and a cursing fit
+Against that hell-born Circe. The crew had gone,
+By one and one, to pale oblivion;
+And I was gazing on the surges prone,
+With many a scalding tear and many a groan,
+When at my feet emerg'd an old man's hand,
+Grasping this scroll, and this same slender wand.
+I knelt with pain--reached out my hand--had grasp'd
+These treasures--touch'd the knuckles--they unclasp'd--
+I caught a finger: but the downward weight
+O'erpowered me--it sank. Then 'gan abate
+The storm, and through chill aguish gloom outburst
+The comfortable sun. I was athirst
+To search the book, and in the warming air
+Parted its dripping leaves with eager care.
+Strange matters did it treat of, and drew on
+My soul page after page, till well-nigh won
+Into forgetfulness; when, stupefied,
+I read these words, and read again, and tried
+My eyes against the heavens, and read again.
+O what a load of misery and pain
+Each Atlas-line bore off!--a shine of hope
+Came gold around me, cheering me to cope
+Strenuous with hellish tyranny. Attend!
+For thou hast brought their promise to an end.
+"In the wide sea there lives a forlorn wretch,
+Doom'd with enfeebled carcase to outstretch
+His loath'd existence through ten centuries,
+And then to die alone. Who can devise
+A total opposition? No one. So
+One million times ocean must ebb and flow,
+And he oppressed. Yet he shall not die,
+These things accomplish'd:--If he utterly
+Scans all the depths of magic, and expounds
+The meanings of all motions, shapes, and sounds;
+If he explores all forms and substances
+Straight homeward to their symbol-essences;
+He shall not die. Moreover, and in chief,
+He must pursue this task of joy and grief
+Most piously;--all lovers tempest-tost,
+And in the savage overwhelming lost,
+He shall deposit side by side, until
+Time's creeping shall the dreary space fulfil:
+Which done, and all these labours ripened,
+A youth, by heavenly power lov'd and led,
+Shall stand before him; whom he shall direct
+How to consummate all. The youth elect
+Must do the thing, or both will be destroy'd."--
+"Then," cried the young Endymion, overjoy'd,
+"We are twin brothers in this destiny!
+Say, I intreat thee, what achievement high
+Is, in this restless world, for me reserv'd.
+What! if from thee my wandering feet had swerv'd,
+Had we both perish'd?"--"Look!" the sage replied,
+"Dost thou not mark a gleaming through the tide,
+Of divers brilliances? 'tis the edifice
+I told thee of, where lovely Scylla lies;
+And where I have enshrined piously
+All lovers, whom fell storms have doom'd to die
+Throughout my bondage." Thus discoursing, on
+They went till unobscur'd the porches shone;
+Which hurryingly they gain'd, and enter'd straight.
+Sure never since king Neptune held his state
+Was seen such wonder underneath the stars.
+Turn to some level plain where haughty Mars
+Has legion'd all his battle; and behold
+How every soldier, with firm foot, doth hold
+His even breast: see, many steeled squares,
+And rigid ranks of iron--whence who dares
+One step? Imagine further, line by line,
+These warrior thousands on the field supine:--
+So in that crystal place, in silent rows,
+Poor lovers lay at rest from joys and woes.--
+The stranger from the mountains, breathless, trac'd
+Such thousands of shut eyes in order plac'd;
+Such ranges of white feet, and patient lips
+All ruddy,--for here death no blossom nips.
+He mark'd their brows and foreheads; saw their hair
+Put sleekly on one side with nicest care;
+And each one's gentle wrists, with reverence,
+Put cross-wise to its heart.
+"Let us commence,
+Whisper'd the guide, stuttering with joy, even now."
+He spake, and, trembling like an aspen-bough,
+Began to tear his scroll in pieces small,
+Uttering the while some mumblings funeral.
+He tore it into pieces small as snow
+That drifts unfeather'd when bleak northerns blow;
+And having done it, took his dark blue cloak
+And bound it round Endymion: then struck
+His wand against the empty air times nine.--
+"What more there is to do, young man, is thine:
+But first a little patience; first undo
+This tangled thread, and wind it to a clue.
+Ah, gentle! 'tis as weak as spider's skein;
+And shouldst thou break it--What, is it done so clean?
+A power overshadows thee! Oh, brave!
+The spite of hell is tumbling to its grave.
+Here is a shell; 'tis pearly blank to me,
+Nor mark'd with any sign or charactery--
+Canst thou read aught? O read for pity's sake!
+Olympus! we are safe! Now, Carian, break
+This wand against yon lyre on the pedestal."
+'Twas done: and straight with sudden swell and fall
+Sweet music breath'd her soul away, and sigh'd
+A lullaby to silence.--"Youth! now strew
+These minced leaves on me, and passing through
+Those files of dead, scatter the same around,
+And thou wilt see the issue."--'Mid the sound
+Of flutes and viols, ravishing his heart,
+Endymion from Glaucus stood apart,
+And scatter'd in his face some fragments light.
+How lightning-swift the change! a youthful wight
+Smiling beneath a coral diadem,
+Out-sparkling sudden like an upturn'd gem,
+Appear'd, and, stepping to a beauteous corse,
+Kneel'd down beside it, and with tenderest force
+Press'd its cold hand, and wept--and Scylla sigh'd!
+Endymion, with quick hand, the charm applied--
+The nymph arose: he left them to their joy,
+And onward went upon his high employ,
+Showering those powerful fragments on the dead.
+And, as he pass'd, each lifted up its head,
+As doth a flower at Apollo's touch.
+Death felt it to his inwards; 'twas too much:
+Death fell a weeping in his charnel-house.
+The Latmian persever'd along, and thus
+All were re-animated. There arose
+A noise of harmony, pulses and throes
+Of gladness in the air--while many, who
+Had died in mutual arms devout and true,
+Sprang to each other madly; and the rest
+Felt a high certainty of being blest.
+They gaz'd upon Endymion. Enchantment
+Grew drunken, and would have its head and bent.
+Delicious symphonies, like airy flowers,
+Budded, and swell'd, and, full-blown, shed full showers
+Of light, soft, unseen leaves of sounds divine.
+The two deliverers tasted a pure wine
+Of happiness, from fairy-press ooz'd out.
+Speechless they eyed each other, and about
+The fair assembly wander'd to and fro,
+Distracted with the richest overflow
+Of joy that ever pour'd from heaven.
+----"Away!"
+Shouted the new-born god; "Follow, and pay
+Our piety to Neptunus supreme!"--
+Then Scylla, blushing sweetly from her dream,
+They led on first, bent to her meek surprise,
+Through portal columns of a giant size,
+Into the vaulted, boundless emerald.
+Joyous all follow'd, as the leader call'd,
+Down marble steps; pouring as easily
+As hour-glass sand--and fast, as you might see
+Swallows obeying the south summer's call,
+Or swans upon a gentle waterfall.
+Thus went that beautiful multitude, nor far,
+Ere from among some rocks of glittering spar,
+Just within ken, they saw descending thick
+Another multitude. Whereat more quick
+Moved either host. On a wide sand they met,
+And of those numbers every eye was wet;
+For each their old love found. A murmuring rose,
+Like what was never heard in all the throes
+Of wind and waters: 'tis past human wit
+To tell; 'tis dizziness to think of it.
+This mighty consummation made, the host
+Mov'd on for many a league; and gain'd, and lost
+Huge sea-marks; vanward swelling in array,
+And from the rear diminishing away,--
+Till a faint dawn surpris'd them. Glaucus cried,
+"Behold! behold, the palace of his pride!
+God Neptune's palaces!" With noise increas'd,
+They shoulder'd on towards that brightening east.
+At every onward step proud domes arose
+In prospect,--diamond gleams, and golden glows
+Of amber 'gainst their faces levelling.
+Joyous, and many as the leaves in spring,
+Still onward; still the splendour gradual swell'd.
+Rich opal domes were seen, on high upheld
+By jasper pillars, letting through their shafts
+A blush of coral. Copious wonder-draughts
+Each gazer drank; and deeper drank more near:
+For what poor mortals fragment up, as mere
+As marble was there lavish, to the vast
+Of one fair palace, that far far surpass'd,
+Even for common bulk, those olden three,
+Memphis, and Babylon, and Nineveh.
+As large, as bright, as colour'd as the bow
+Of Iris, when unfading it doth shew
+Beyond a silvery shower, was the arch
+Through which this Paphian army took its march,
+Into the outer courts of Neptune's state:
+Whence could be seen, direct, a golden gate,
+To which the leaders sped; but not half raught
+Ere it burst open swift as fairy thought,
+And made those dazzled thousands veil their eyes
+Like callow eagles at the first sunrise.
+Soon with an eagle nativeness their gaze
+Ripe from hue-golden swoons took all the blaze,
+And then, behold! large Neptune on his throne
+Of emerald deep: yet not exalt alone;
+At his right hand stood winged Love, and on
+His left sat smiling Beauty's paragon.
+Far as the mariner on highest mast
+Can see all round upon the calmed vast,
+So wide was Neptune's hall: and as the blue
+Doth vault the waters, so the waters drew
+Their doming curtains, high, magnificent,
+Aw'd from the throne aloof;--and when storm-rent
+Disclos'd the thunder-gloomings in Jove's air;
+But sooth'd as now, flash'd sudden everywhere,
+Noiseless, sub-marine cloudlets, glittering
+Death to a human eye: for there did spring
+From natural west, and east, and south, and north,
+A light as of four sunsets, blazing forth
+A gold-green zenith 'bove the Sea-God's head.
+Of lucid depth the floor, and far outspread
+As breezeless lake, on which the slim canoe
+Of feather'd Indian darts about, as through
+The delicatest air: air verily,
+But for the portraiture of clouds and sky:
+This palace floor breath-air,--but for the amaze
+Of deep-seen wonders motionless,--and blaze
+Of the dome pomp, reflected in extremes,
+Globing a golden sphere.
+They stood in dreams
+Till Triton blew his horn. The palace rang;
+The Nereids danc'd; the Syrens faintly sang;
+And the great Sea-King bow'd his dripping head.
+Then Love took wing, and from his pinions shed
+On all the multitude a nectarous dew.
+The ooze-born Goddess beckoned and drew
+Fair Scylla and her guides to conference;
+And when they reach'd the throned eminence
+She kist the sea-nymph's cheek,--who sat her down
+A toying with the doves. Then,--"Mighty crown
+And sceptre of this kingdom!" Venus said,
+"Thy vows were on a time to Nais paid:
+Behold!"--Two copious tear-drops instant fell
+From the God's large eyes; he smil'd delectable,
+And over Glaucus held his blessing hands.--
+"Endymion! Ah! still wandering in the bands
+Of love? Now this is cruel. Since the hour
+I met thee in earth's bosom, all my power
+Have I put forth to serve thee. What, not yet
+Escap'd from dull mortality's harsh net?
+A little patience, youth! 'twill not be long,
+Or I am skilless quite: an idle tongue,
+A humid eye, and steps luxurious,
+Where these are new and strange, are ominous.
+Aye, I have seen these signs in one of heaven,
+When others were all blind; and were I given
+To utter secrets, haply I might say
+Some pleasant words:--but Love will have his day.
+So wait awhile expectant. Pr'ythee soon,
+Even in the passing of thine honey-moon,
+Visit my Cytherea: thou wilt find
+Cupid well-natured, my Adonis kind;
+And pray persuade with thee--Ah, I have done,
+All blisses be upon thee, my sweet son!"--
+Thus the fair goddess: while Endymion
+Knelt to receive those accents halcyon.
+Meantime a glorious revelry began
+Before the Water-Monarch. Nectar ran
+In courteous fountains to all cups outreach'd;
+And plunder'd vines, teeming exhaustless, pleach'd
+New growth about each shell and pendent lyre;
+The which, in disentangling for their fire,
+Pull'd down fresh foliage and coverture
+For dainty toying. Cupid, empire-sure,
+Flutter'd and laugh'd, and oft-times through the throng
+Made a delighted way. Then dance, and song,
+And garlanding grew wild; and pleasure reign'd.
+In harmless tendril they each other chain'd,
+And strove who should be smother'd deepest in
+Fresh crush of leaves.
+O 'tis a very sin
+For one so weak to venture his poor verse
+In such a place as this. O do not curse,
+High Muses! let him hurry to the ending.
+All suddenly were silent. A soft blending
+Of dulcet instruments came charmingly;
+And then a hymn.
+"KING of the stormy sea!
+Brother of Jove, and co-inheritor
+Of elements! Eternally before
+Thee the waves awful bow. Fast, stubborn rock,
+At thy fear'd trident shrinking, doth unlock
+Its deep foundations, hissing into foam.
+All mountain-rivers lost, in the wide home
+Of thy capacious bosom ever flow.
+Thou frownest, and old Eolus thy foe
+Skulks to his cavern, 'mid the gruff complaint
+Of all his rebel tempests. Dark clouds faint
+When, from thy diadem, a silver gleam
+Slants over blue dominion. Thy bright team
+Gulphs in the morning light, and scuds along
+To bring thee nearer to that golden song
+Apollo singeth, while his chariot
+Waits at the doors of heaven. Thou art not
+For scenes like this: an empire stern hast thou;
+And it hath furrow'd that large front: yet now,
+As newly come of heaven, dost thou sit
+To blend and interknit
+Subdued majesty with this glad time.
+O shell-borne King sublime!
+We lay our hearts before thee evermore--
+We sing, and we adore!
+"Breathe softly, flutes;
+Be tender of your strings, ye soothing lutes;
+Nor be the trumpet heard! O vain, O vain;
+Not flowers budding in an April rain,
+Nor breath of sleeping dove, nor river's flow,--
+No, nor the Eolian twang of Love's own bow,
+Can mingle music fit for the soft ear
+Of goddess Cytherea!
+Yet deign, white Queen of Beauty, thy fair eyes
+On our souls' sacrifice.
+"Bright-winged Child!
+Who has another care when thou hast smil'd?
+Unfortunates on earth, we see at last
+All death-shadows, and glooms that overcast
+Our spirits, fann'd away by thy light pinions.
+O sweetest essence! sweetest of all minions!
+God of warm pulses, and dishevell'd hair,
+And panting bosoms bare!
+Dear unseen light in darkness! eclipser
+Of light in light! delicious poisoner!
+Thy venom'd goblet will we quaff until
+We fill--we fill!
+And by thy Mother's lips----"
+Was heard no more
+For clamour, when the golden palace door
+Opened again, and from without, in shone
+A new magnificence. On oozy throne
+Smooth-moving came Oceanus the old,
+To take a latest glimpse at his sheep-fold,
+Before he went into his quiet cave
+To muse for ever--Then a lucid wave,
+Scoop'd from its trembling sisters of mid-sea,
+Afloat, and pillowing up the majesty
+Of Doris, and the Egean seer, her spouse--
+Next, on a dolphin, clad in laurel boughs,
+Theban Amphion leaning on his lute:
+His fingers went across it--All were mute
+To gaze on Amphitrite, queen of pearls,
+And Thetis pearly too.--
+The palace whirls
+Around giddy Endymion; seeing he
+Was there far strayed from mortality.
+He could not bear it--shut his eyes in vain;
+Imagination gave a dizzier pain.
+"O I shall die! sweet Venus, be my stay!
+Where is my lovely mistress? Well-away!
+I die--I hear her voice--I feel my wing--"
+At Neptune's feet he sank. A sudden ring
+Of Nereids were about him, in kind strife
+To usher back his spirit into life:
+But still he slept. At last they interwove
+Their cradling arms, and purpos'd to convey
+Towards a crystal bower far away.
+Lo! while slow carried through the pitying crowd,
+To his inward senses these words spake aloud;
+Written in star-light on the dark above:
+Dearest Endymion! my entire love!
+How have I dwelt in fear of fate: 'tis done--
+Immortal bliss for me too hast thou won.
+Arise then! for the hen-dove shall not hatch
+Her ready eggs, before I'll kissing snatch
+Thee into endless heaven. Awake! awake!
+The youth at once arose: a placid lake
+Came quiet to his eyes; and forest green,
+Cooler than all the wonders he had seen,
+Lull'd with its simple song his fluttering breast.
+How happy once again in grassy nest!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	48. Addressed To Haydon	|	<poem>
+High-mindedness, a jealousy for good,
+A loving-kindness for the great man's fame,
+Dwells here and there with people of no name,
+In noisome alley, and in pathless wood:
+And where we think the truth least understood,
+Oft may be found a "singleness of aim,"
+That ought to frighten into hooded shame
+A money-mongering, pitiable brood.
+How glorious this affection for the cause
+Of steadfast genius, toiling gallantly!
+What when a stout unbending champion awes
+Envy and malice to their native sty?
+Unnumbered souls breathe out a still applause,
+Proud to behold him in his country's eye.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	49. Endymion: Book II	|	<poem>
+O Sovereign power of love! O grief! O balm!
+All records, saving thine, come cool, and calm,
+And shadowy, through the mist of passed years:
+For others, good or bad, hatred and tears
+Have become indolent; but touching thine,
+One sigh doth echo, one poor sob doth pine,
+One kiss brings honey-dew from buried days.
+The woes of Troy, towers smothering o'er their blaze,
+Stiff-holden shields, far-piercing spears, keen blades,
+Struggling, and blood, and shrieks--all dimly fades
+Into some backward corner of the brain;
+Yet, in our very souls, we feel amain
+The close of Troilus and Cressid sweet.
+Hence, pageant history! hence, gilded cheat!
+Swart planet in the universe of deeds!
+Wide sea, that one continuous murmur breeds
+Along the pebbled shore of memory!
+Many old rotten-timber'd boats there be
+Upon thy vaporous bosom, magnified
+To goodly vessels; many a sail of pride,
+And golden keel'd, is left unlaunch'd and dry.
+But wherefore this? What care, though owl did fly
+About the great Athenian admiral's mast?
+What care, though striding Alexander past
+The Indus with his Macedonian numbers?
+Though old Ulysses tortured from his slumbers
+The glutted Cyclops, what care?--Juliet leaning
+Amid her window-flowers,--sighing,--weaning
+Tenderly her fancy from its maiden snow,
+Doth more avail than these: the silver flow
+Of Hero's tears, the swoon of Imogen,
+Fair Pastorella in the bandit's den,
+Are things to brood on with more ardency
+Than the death-day of empires. Fearfully
+Must such conviction come upon his head,
+Who, thus far, discontent, has dared to tread,
+Without one muse's smile, or kind behest,
+The path of love and poesy. But rest,
+In chaffing restlessness, is yet more drear
+Than to be crush'd, in striving to uprear
+Love's standard on the battlements of song.
+So once more days and nights aid me along,
+Like legion'd soldiers.
+Brain-sick shepherd-prince,
+What promise hast thou faithful guarded since
+The day of sacrifice? Or, have new sorrows
+Come with the constant dawn upon thy morrows?
+Alas! 'tis his old grief. For many days,
+Has he been wandering in uncertain ways:
+Through wilderness, and woods of mossed oaks;
+Counting his woe-worn minutes, by the strokes
+Of the lone woodcutter; and listening still,
+Hour after hour, to each lush-leav'd rill.
+Now he is sitting by a shady spring,
+And elbow-deep with feverous fingering
+Stems the upbursting cold: a wild rose tree
+Pavilions him in bloom, and he doth see
+A bud which snares his fancy: lo! but now
+He plucks it, dips its stalk in the water: how!
+It swells, it buds, it flowers beneath his sight;
+And, in the middle, there is softly pight
+A golden butterfly; upon whose wings
+There must be surely character'd strange things,
+For with wide eye he wonders, and smiles oft.
+Lightly this little herald flew aloft,
+Follow'd by glad Endymion's clasped hands:
+Onward it flies. From languor's sullen bands
+His limbs are loos'd, and eager, on he hies
+Dazzled to trace it in the sunny skies.
+It seem'd he flew, the way so easy was;
+And like a new-born spirit did he pass
+Through the green evening quiet in the sun,
+O'er many a heath, through many a woodland dun,
+Through buried paths, where sleepy twilight dreams
+The summer time away. One track unseams
+A wooded cleft, and, far away, the blue
+Of ocean fades upon him; then, anew,
+He sinks adown a solitary glen,
+Where there was never sound of mortal men,
+Saving, perhaps, some snow-light cadences
+Melting to silence, when upon the breeze
+Some holy bark let forth an anthem sweet,
+To cheer itself to Delphi. Still his feet
+Went swift beneath the merry-winged guide,
+Until it reached a splashing fountain's side
+That, near a cavern's mouth, for ever pour'd
+Unto the temperate air: then high it soar'd,
+And, downward, suddenly began to dip,
+As if, athirst with so much toil, 'twould sip
+The crystal spout-head: so it did, with touch
+Most delicate, as though afraid to smutch
+Even with mealy gold the waters clear.
+But, at that very touch, to disappear
+So fairy-quick, was strange! Bewildered,
+Endymion sought around, and shook each bed
+Of covert flowers in vain; and then he flung
+Himself along the grass. What gentle tongue,
+What whisperer disturb'd his gloomy rest?
+It was a nymph uprisen to the breast
+In the fountain's pebbly margin, and she stood
+'Mong lilies, like the youngest of the brood.
+To him her dripping hand she softly kist,
+And anxiously began to plait and twist
+Her ringlets round her fingers, saying: "Youth!
+Too long, alas, hast thou starv'd on the ruth,
+The bitterness of love: too long indeed,
+Seeing thou art so gentle. Could I weed
+Thy soul of care, by heavens, I would offer
+All the bright riches of my crystal coffer
+To Amphitrite; all my clear-eyed fish,
+Golden, or rainbow-sided, or purplish,
+Vermilion-tail'd, or finn'd with silvery gauze;
+Yea, or my veined pebble-floor, that draws
+A virgin light to the deep; my grotto-sands
+Tawny and gold, ooz'd slowly from far lands
+By my diligent springs; my level lilies, shells,
+My charming rod, my potent river spells;
+Yes, every thing, even to the pearly cup
+Meander gave me,--for I bubbled up
+To fainting creatures in a desert wild.
+But woe is me, I am but as a child
+To gladden thee; and all I dare to say,
+Is, that I pity thee; that on this day
+I've been thy guide; that thou must wander far
+In other regions, past the scanty bar
+To mortal steps, before thou cans't be ta'en
+From every wasting sigh, from every pain,
+Into the gentle bosom of thy love.
+Why it is thus, one knows in heaven above:
+But, a poor Naiad, I guess not. Farewel!
+I have a ditty for my hollow cell."
+Hereat, she vanished from Endymion's gaze,
+Who brooded o'er the water in amaze:
+The dashing fount pour'd on, and where its pool
+Lay, half asleep, in grass and rushes cool,
+Quick waterflies and gnats were sporting still,
+And fish were dimpling, as if good nor ill
+Had fallen out that hour. The wanderer,
+Holding his forehead, to keep off the burr
+Of smothering fancies, patiently sat down;
+And, while beneath the evening's sleepy frown
+Glow-worms began to trim their starry lamps,
+Thus breath'd he to himself: "Whoso encamps
+To take a fancied city of delight,
+O what a wretch is he! and when 'tis his,
+After long toil and travelling, to miss
+The kernel of his hopes, how more than vile:
+Yet, for him there's refreshment even in toil;
+Another city doth he set about,
+Free from the smallest pebble-bead of doubt
+That he will seize on trickling honey-combs:
+Alas, he finds them dry; and then he foams,
+And onward to another city speeds.
+But this is human life: the war, the deeds,
+The disappointment, the anxiety,
+Imagination's struggles, far and nigh,
+All human; bearing in themselves this good,
+That they are sill the air, the subtle food,
+To make us feel existence, and to shew
+How quiet death is. Where soil is men grow,
+Whether to weeds or flowers; but for me,
+There is no depth to strike in: I can see
+Nought earthly worth my compassing; so stand
+Upon a misty, jutting head of land--
+Alone? No, no; and by the Orphean lute,
+When mad Eurydice is listening to 't;
+I'd rather stand upon this misty peak,
+With not a thing to sigh for, or to seek,
+But the soft shadow of my thrice-seen love,
+Than be--I care not what. O meekest dove
+Of heaven! O Cynthia, ten-times bright and fair!
+From thy blue throne, now filling all the air,
+Glance but one little beam of temper'd light
+Into my bosom, that the dreadful might
+And tyranny of love be somewhat scar'd!
+Yet do not so, sweet queen; one torment spar'd,
+Would give a pang to jealous misery,
+Worse than the torment's self: but rather tie
+Large wings upon my shoulders, and point out
+My love's far dwelling. Though the playful rout
+Of Cupids shun thee, too divine art thou,
+Too keen in beauty, for thy silver prow
+Not to have dipp'd in love's most gentle stream.
+O be propitious, nor severely deem
+My madness impious; for, by all the stars
+That tend thy bidding, I do think the bars
+That kept my spirit in are burst--that I
+Am sailing with thee through the dizzy sky!
+How beautiful thou art! The world how deep!
+How tremulous-dazzlingly the wheels sweep
+Around their axle! Then these gleaming reins,
+How lithe! When this thy chariot attains
+Is airy goal, haply some bower veils
+Those twilight eyes? Those eyes!--my spirit fails--
+Dear goddess, help! or the wide-gaping air
+Will gulph me--help!"--At this with madden'd stare,
+And lifted hands, and trembling lips he stood;
+Like old Deucalion mountain'd o'er the flood,
+Or blind Orion hungry for the morn.
+And, but from the deep cavern there was borne
+A voice, he had been froze to senseless stone;
+Nor sigh of his, nor plaint, nor passion'd moan
+Had more been heard. Thus swell'd it forth: "Descend,
+Young mountaineer! descend where alleys bend
+Into the sparry hollows of the world!
+Oft hast thou seen bolts of the thunder hurl'd
+As from thy threshold, day by day hast been
+A little lower than the chilly sheen
+Of icy pinnacles, and dipp'dst thine arms
+Into the deadening ether that still charms
+Their marble being: now, as deep profound
+As those are high, descend! He ne'er is crown'd
+With immortality, who fears to follow
+Where airy voices lead: so through the hollow,
+The silent mysteries of earth, descend!"
+He heard but the last words, nor could contend
+One moment in reflection: for he fled
+Into the fearful deep, to hide his head
+From the clear moon, the trees, and coming madness.
+'Twas far too strange, and wonderful for sadness;
+Sharpening, by degrees, his appetite
+To dive into the deepest. Dark, nor light,
+The region; nor bright, nor sombre wholly,
+But mingled up; a gleaming melancholy;
+A dusky empire and its diadems;
+One faint eternal eventide of gems.
+Aye, millions sparkled on a vein of gold,
+Along whose track the prince quick footsteps told,
+With all its lines abrupt and angular:
+Out-shooting sometimes, like a meteor-star,
+Through a vast antre; then the metal woof,
+Like Vulcan's rainbow, with some monstrous roof
+Curves hugely: now, far in the deep abyss,
+It seems an angry lightning, and doth hiss
+Fancy into belief: anon it leads
+Through winding passages, where sameness breeds
+Vexing conceptions of some sudden change;
+Whether to silver grots, or giant range
+Of sapphire columns, or fantastic bridge
+Athwart a flood of crystal. On a ridge
+Now fareth he, that o'er the vast beneath
+Towers like an ocean-cliff, and whence he seeth
+A hundred waterfalls, whose voices come
+But as the murmuring surge. Chilly and numb
+His bosom grew, when first he, far away,
+Descried an orbed diamond, set to fray
+Old darkness from his throne: 'twas like the sun
+Uprisen o'er chaos: and with such a stun
+Came the amazement, that, absorb'd in it,
+He saw not fiercer wonders--past the wit
+Of any spirit to tell, but one of those
+Who, when this planet's sphering time doth close,
+Will be its high remembrancers: who they?
+The mighty ones who have made eternal day
+For Greece and England. While astonishment
+With deep-drawn sighs was quieting, he went
+Into a marble gallery, passing through
+A mimic temple, so complete and true
+In sacred custom, that he well nigh fear'd
+To search it inwards, whence far off appear'd,
+Through a long pillar'd vista, a fair shrine,
+And, just beyond, on light tiptoe divine,
+A quiver'd Dian. Stepping awfully,
+The youth approach'd; oft turning his veil'd eye
+Down sidelong aisles, and into niches old.
+And when, more near against the marble cold
+He had touch'd his forehead, he began to thread
+All courts and passages, where silence dead
+Rous'd by his whispering footsteps murmured faint:
+And long he travers'd to and fro, to acquaint
+Himself with every mystery, and awe;
+Till, weary, he sat down before the maw
+Of a wide outlet, fathomless and dim
+To wild uncertainty and shadows grim.
+There, when new wonders ceas'd to float before,
+And thoughts of self came on, how crude and sore
+The journey homeward to habitual self!
+A mad-pursuing of the fog-born elf,
+Whose flitting lantern, through rude nettle-briar,
+Cheats us into a swamp, into a fire,
+Into the bosom of a hated thing.
+What misery most drowningly doth sing
+In lone Endymion's ear, now he has caught
+The goal of consciousness? Ah, 'tis the thought,
+The deadly feel of solitude: for lo!
+He cannot see the heavens, nor the flow
+Of rivers, nor hill-flowers running wild
+In pink and purple chequer, nor, up-pil'd,
+The cloudy rack slow journeying in the west,
+Like herded elephants; nor felt, nor prest
+Cool grass, nor tasted the fresh slumberous air;
+But far from such companionship to wear
+An unknown time, surcharg'd with grief, away,
+Was now his lot. And must he patient stay,
+Tracing fantastic figures with his spear?
+"No!" exclaimed he, "why should I tarry here?"
+No! loudly echoed times innumerable.
+At which he straightway started, and 'gan tell
+His paces back into the temple's chief;
+Warming and glowing strong in the belief
+Of help from Dian: so that when again
+He caught her airy form, thus did he plain,
+Moving more near the while. "O Haunter chaste
+Of river sides, and woods, and heathy waste,
+Where with thy silver bow and arrows keen
+Art thou now forested? O woodland Queen,
+What smoothest air thy smoother forehead woos?
+Where dost thou listen to the wide halloos
+Of thy disparted nymphs? Through what dark tree
+Glimmers thy crescent? Wheresoe'er it be,
+'Tis in the breath of heaven: thou dost taste
+Freedom as none can taste it, nor dost waste
+Thy loveliness in dismal elements;
+But, finding in our green earth sweet contents,
+There livest blissfully. Ah, if to thee
+It feels Elysian, how rich to me,
+An exil'd mortal, sounds its pleasant name!
+Within my breast there lives a choking flame--
+O let me cool it among the zephyr-boughs!
+A homeward fever parches up my tongue--
+O let me slake it at the running springs!
+Upon my ear a noisy nothing rings--
+O let me once more hear the linnet's note!
+Before mine eyes thick films and shadows float--
+O let me 'noint them with the heaven's light!
+Dost thou now lave thy feet and ankles white?
+O think how sweet to me the freshening sluice!
+Dost thou now please thy thirst with berry-juice?
+O think how this dry palate would rejoice!
+If in soft slumber thou dost hear my voice,
+Oh think how I should love a bed of flowers!--
+Young goddess! let me see my native bowers!
+Deliver me from this rapacious deep!"
+Thus ending loudly, as he would o'erleap
+His destiny, alert he stood: but when
+Obstinate silence came heavily again,
+Feeling about for its old couch of space
+And airy cradle, lowly bow'd his face
+Desponding, o'er the marble floor's cold thrill.
+But 'twas not long; for, sweeter than the rill
+To its old channel, or a swollen tide
+To margin sallows, were the leaves he spied,
+And flowers, and wreaths, and ready myrtle crowns
+Up heaping through the slab: refreshment drowns
+Itself, and strives its own delights to hide--
+Nor in one spot alone; the floral pride
+In a long whispering birth enchanted grew
+Before his footsteps; as when heav'd anew
+Old ocean rolls a lengthened wave to the shore,
+Down whose green back the short-liv'd foam, all hoar,
+Bursts gradual, with a wayward indolence.
+Increasing still in heart, and pleasant sense,
+Upon his fairy journey on he hastes;
+So anxious for the end, he scarcely wastes
+One moment with his hand among the sweets:
+Onward he goes--he stops--his bosom beats
+As plainly in his ear, as the faint charm
+Of which the throbs were born. This still alarm,
+This sleepy music, forc'd him walk tiptoe:
+For it came more softly than the east could blow
+Arion's magic to the Atlantic isles;
+Or than the west, made jealous by the smiles
+Of thron'd Apollo, could breathe back the lyre
+To seas Ionian and Tyrian.
+O did he ever live, that lonely man,
+Who lov'd--and music slew not? 'Tis the pest
+Of love, that fairest joys give most unrest;
+That things of delicate and tenderest worth
+Are swallow'd all, and made a seared dearth,
+By one consuming flame: it doth immerse
+And suffocate true blessings in a curse.
+Half-happy, by comparison of bliss,
+Is miserable. 'Twas even so with this
+Dew-dropping melody, in the Carian's ear;
+First heaven, then hell, and then forgotten clear,
+Vanish'd in elemental passion.
+And down some swart abysm he had gone,
+Had not a heavenly guide benignant led
+To where thick myrtle branches, 'gainst his head
+Brushing, awakened: then the sounds again
+Went noiseless as a passing noontide rain
+Over a bower, where little space he stood;
+For as the sunset peeps into a wood
+So saw he panting light, and towards it went
+Through winding alleys; and lo, wonderment!
+Upon soft verdure saw, one here, one there,
+Cupids a slumbering on their pinions fair.
+After a thousand mazes overgone,
+At last, with sudden step, he came upon
+A chamber, myrtle wall'd, embowered high,
+Full of light, incense, tender minstrelsy,
+And more of beautiful and strange beside:
+For on a silken couch of rosy pride,
+In midst of all, there lay a sleeping youth
+Of fondest beauty; fonder, in fair sooth,
+Than sighs could fathom, or contentment reach:
+And coverlids gold-tinted like the peach,
+Or ripe October's faded marigolds,
+Fell sleek about him in a thousand folds--
+Not hiding up an Apollonian curve
+Of neck and shoulder, nor the tenting swerve
+Of knee from knee, nor ankles pointing light;
+But rather, giving them to the filled sight
+Officiously. Sideway his face repos'd
+On one white arm, and tenderly unclos'd,
+By tenderest pressure, a faint damask mouth
+To slumbery pout; just as the morning south
+Disparts a dew-lipp'd rose. Above his head,
+Four lily stalks did their white honours wed
+To make a coronal; and round him grew
+All tendrils green, of every bloom and hue,
+Together intertwin'd and trammel'd fresh:
+The vine of glossy sprout; the ivy mesh,
+Shading its Ethiop berries; and woodbine,
+Of velvet leaves and bugle-blooms divine;
+Convolvulus in streaked vases flush;
+The creeper, mellowing for an autumn blush;
+And virgin's bower, trailing airily;
+With others of the sisterhood. Hard by,
+Stood serene Cupids watching silently.
+One, kneeling to a lyre, touch'd the strings,
+Muffling to death the pathos with his wings;
+And, ever and anon, uprose to look
+At the youth's slumber; while another took
+A willow-bough, distilling odorous dew,
+And shook it on his hair; another flew
+In through the woven roof, and fluttering-wise
+Rain'd violets upon his sleeping eyes.
+At these enchantments, and yet many more,
+The breathless Latmian wonder'd o'er and o'er;
+Until, impatient in embarrassment,
+He forthright pass'd, and lightly treading went
+To that same feather'd lyrist, who straightway,
+Smiling, thus whisper'd: "Though from upper day
+Thou art a wanderer, and thy presence here
+Might seem unholy, be of happy cheer!
+For 'tis the nicest touch of human honour,
+When some ethereal and high-favouring donor
+Presents immortal bowers to mortal sense;
+As now 'tis done to thee, Endymion. Hence
+Was I in no wise startled. So recline
+Upon these living flowers. Here is wine,
+Alive with sparkles--never, I aver,
+Since Ariadne was a vintager,
+So cool a purple: taste these juicy pears,
+Sent me by sad Vertumnus, when his fears
+Were high about Pomona: here is cream,
+Deepening to richness from a snowy gleam;
+Sweeter than that nurse Amalthea skimm'd
+For the boy Jupiter: and here, undimm'd
+By any touch, a bunch of blooming plums
+Ready to melt between an infant's gums:
+And here is manna pick'd from Syrian trees,
+In starlight, by the three Hesperides.
+Feast on, and meanwhile I will let thee know
+Of all these things around us." He did so,
+Still brooding o'er the cadence of his lyre;
+And thus: "I need not any hearing tire
+By telling how the sea-born goddess pin'd
+For a mortal youth, and how she strove to bind
+Him all in all unto her doting self.
+Who would not be so prison'd? but, fond elf,
+He was content to let her amorous plea
+Faint through his careless arms; content to see
+An unseiz'd heaven dying at his feet;
+Content, O fool! to make a cold retreat,
+When on the pleasant grass such love, lovelorn,
+Lay sorrowing; when every tear was born
+Of diverse passion; when her lips and eyes
+Were clos'd in sullen moisture, and quick sighs
+Came vex'd and pettish through her nostrils small.
+Hush! no exclaim--yet, justly mightst thou call
+Curses upon his head.--I was half glad,
+But my poor mistress went distract and mad,
+When the boar tusk'd him: so away she flew
+To Jove's high throne, and by her plainings drew
+Immortal tear-drops down the thunderer's beard;
+Whereon, it was decreed he should be rear'd
+Each summer time to life. Lo! this is he,
+That same Adonis, safe in the privacy
+Of this still region all his winter-sleep.
+Aye, sleep; for when our love-sick queen did weep
+Over his waned corse, the tremulous shower
+Heal'd up the wound, and, with a balmy power,
+Medicined death to a lengthened drowsiness:
+The which she fills with visions, and doth dress
+In all this quiet luxury; and hath set
+Us young immortals, without any let,
+To watch his slumber through. 'Tis well nigh pass'd,
+Even to a moment's filling up, and fast
+She scuds with summer breezes, to pant through
+The first long kiss, warm firstling, to renew
+Embower'd sports in Cytherea's isle.
+Look! how those winged listeners all this while
+Stand anxious: see! behold!"--This clamant word
+Broke through the careful silence; for they heard
+A rustling noise of leaves, and out there flutter'd
+Pigeons and doves: Adonis something mutter'd,
+The while one hand, that erst upon his thigh
+Lay dormant, mov'd convuls'd and gradually
+Up to his forehead. Then there was a hum
+Of sudden voices, echoing, "Come! come!
+Arise! awake! Clear summer has forth walk'd
+Unto the clover-sward, and she has talk'd
+Full soothingly to every nested finch:
+Rise, Cupids! or we'll give the blue-bell pinch
+To your dimpled arms. Once more sweet life begin!"
+At this, from every side they hurried in,
+Rubbing their sleepy eyes with lazy wrists,
+And doubling overhead their little fists
+In backward yawns. But all were soon alive:
+For as delicious wine doth, sparkling, dive
+In nectar'd clouds and curls through water fair,
+So from the arbour roof down swell'd an air
+Odorous and enlivening; making all
+To laugh, and play, and sing, and loudly call
+For their sweet queen: when lo! the wreathed green
+Disparted, and far upward could be seen
+Blue heaven, and a silver car, air-borne,
+Whose silent wheels, fresh wet from clouds of morn,
+Spun off a drizzling dew,--which falling chill
+On soft Adonis' shoulders, made him still
+Nestle and turn uneasily about.
+Soon were the white doves plain, with necks stretch'd out,
+And silken traces lighten'd in descent;
+And soon, returning from love's banishment,
+Queen Venus leaning downward open arm'd:
+Her shadow fell upon his breast, and charm'd
+A tumult to his heart, and a new life
+Into his eyes. Ah, miserable strife,
+But for her comforting! unhappy sight,
+But meeting her blue orbs! Who, who can write
+Of these first minutes? The unchariest muse
+To embracements warm as theirs makes coy excuse.
+O it has ruffled every spirit there,
+Saving love's self, who stands superb to share
+The general gladness: awfully he stands;
+A sovereign quell is in his waving hands;
+No sight can bear the lightning of his bow;
+His quiver is mysterious, none can know
+What themselves think of it; from forth his eyes
+There darts strange light of varied hues and dyes:
+A scowl is sometimes on his brow, but who
+Look full upon it feel anon the blue
+Of his fair eyes run liquid through their souls.
+Endymion feels it, and no more controls
+The burning prayer within him; so, bent low,
+He had begun a plaining of his woe.
+But Venus, bending forward, said: "My child,
+Favour this gentle youth; his days are wild
+With love--he--but alas! too well I see
+Thou know'st the deepness of his misery.
+Ah, smile not so, my son: I tell thee true,
+That when through heavy hours I used to rue
+The endless sleep of this new-born Adon',
+This stranger ay I pitied. For upon
+A dreary morning once I fled away
+Into the breezy clouds, to weep and pray
+For this my love: for vexing Mars had teaz'd
+Me even to tears: thence, when a little eas'd,
+Down-looking, vacant, through a hazy wood,
+I saw this youth as he despairing stood:
+Those same dark curls blown vagrant in the wind:
+Those same full fringed lids a constant blind
+Over his sullen eyes: I saw him throw
+Himself on wither'd leaves, even as though
+Death had come sudden; for no jot he mov'd,
+Yet mutter'd wildly. I could hear he lov'd
+Some fair immortal, and that his embrace
+Had zoned her through the night. There is no trace
+Of this in heaven: I have mark'd each cheek,
+And find it is the vainest thing to seek;
+And that of all things 'tis kept secretest.
+Endymion! one day thou wilt be blest:
+So still obey the guiding hand that fends
+Thee safely through these wonders for sweet ends.
+'Tis a concealment needful in extreme;
+And if I guess'd not so, the sunny beam
+Thou shouldst mount up to with me. Now adieu!
+Here must we leave thee."--At these words up flew
+The impatient doves, up rose the floating car,
+Up went the hum celestial. High afar
+The Latmian saw them minish into nought;
+And, when all were clear vanish'd, still he caught
+A vivid lightning from that dreadful bow.
+When all was darkened, with Etnean throe
+The earth clos'd--gave a solitary moan--
+And left him once again in twilight lone.
+He did not rave, he did not stare aghast,
+For all those visions were o'ergone, and past,
+And he in loneliness: he felt assur'd
+Of happy times, when all he had endur'd
+Would seem a feather to the mighty prize.
+So, with unusual gladness, on he hies
+Through caves, and palaces of mottled ore,
+Gold dome, and crystal wall, and turquois floor,
+Black polish'd porticos of awful shade,
+And, at the last, a diamond balustrade,
+Leading afar past wild magnificence,
+Spiral through ruggedest loopholes, and thence
+Stretching across a void, then guiding o'er
+Enormous chasms, where, all foam and roar,
+Streams subterranean tease their granite beds;
+Then heighten'd just above the silvery heads
+Of a thousand fountains, so that he could dash
+The waters with his spear; but at the splash,
+Done heedlessly, those spouting columns rose
+Sudden a poplar's height, and 'gan to enclose
+His diamond path with fretwork, streaming round
+Alive, and dazzling cool, and with a sound,
+Haply, like dolphin tumults, when sweet shells
+Welcome the float of Thetis. Long he dwells
+On this delight; for, every minute's space,
+The streams with changed magic interlace:
+Sometimes like delicatest lattices,
+Cover'd with crystal vines; then weeping trees,
+Moving about as in a gentle wind,
+Which, in a wink, to watery gauze refin'd,
+Pour'd into shapes of curtain'd canopies,
+Spangled, and rich with liquid broideries
+Of flowers, peacocks, swans, and naiads fair.
+Swifter than lightning went these wonders rare;
+And then the water, into stubborn streams
+Collecting, mimick'd the wrought oaken beams,
+Pillars, and frieze, and high fantastic roof,
+Of those dusk places in times far aloof
+Cathedrals call'd. He bade a loth farewel
+To these founts Protean, passing gulph, and dell,
+And torrent, and ten thousand jutting shapes,
+Half seen through deepest gloom, and griesly gapes,
+Blackening on every side, and overhead
+A vaulted dome like Heaven's, far bespread
+With starlight gems: aye, all so huge and strange,
+The solitary felt a hurried change
+Working within him into something dreary,--
+Vex'd like a morning eagle, lost, and weary,
+And purblind amid foggy, midnight wolds.
+But he revives at once: for who beholds
+New sudden things, nor casts his mental slough?
+Forth from a rugged arch, in the dusk below,
+Came mother Cybele! alone--alone--
+In sombre chariot; dark foldings thrown
+About her majesty, and front death-pale,
+With turrets crown'd. Four maned lions hale
+The sluggish wheels; solemn their toothed maws,
+Their surly eyes brow-hidden, heavy paws
+Uplifted drowsily, and nervy tails
+Cowering their tawny brushes. Silent sails
+This shadowy queen athwart, and faints away
+In another gloomy arch.
+Wherefore delay,
+Young traveller, in such a mournful place?
+Art thou wayworn, or canst not further trace
+The diamond path? And does it indeed end
+Abrupt in middle air? Yet earthward bend
+Thy forehead, and to Jupiter cloud-borne
+Call ardently! He was indeed wayworn;
+Abrupt, in middle air, his way was lost;
+To cloud-borne Jove he bowed, and there crost
+Towards him a large eagle, 'twixt whose wings,
+Without one impious word, himself he flings,
+Committed to the darkness and the gloom:
+Down, down, uncertain to what pleasant doom,
+Swift as a fathoming plummet down he fell
+Through unknown things; till exhaled asphodel,
+And rose, with spicy fannings interbreath'd,
+Came swelling forth where little caves were wreath'd
+So thick with leaves and mosses, that they seem'd
+Large honey-combs of green, and freshly teem'd
+With airs delicious. In the greenest nook
+The eagle landed him, and farewel took.
+It was a jasmine bower, all bestrown
+With golden moss. His every sense had grown
+Ethereal for pleasure; 'bove his head
+Flew a delight half-graspable; his tread
+Was Hesperean; to his capable ears
+Silence was music from the holy spheres;
+A dewy luxury was in his eyes;
+The little flowers felt his pleasant sighs
+And stirr'd them faintly. Verdant cave and cell
+He wander'd through, oft wondering at such swell
+Of sudden exaltation: but, "Alas!
+Said he, "will all this gush of feeling pass
+Away in solitude? And must they wane,
+Like melodies upon a sandy plain,
+Without an echo? Then shall I be left
+So sad, so melancholy, so bereft!
+Yet still I feel immortal! O my love,
+My breath of life, where art thou? High above,
+Dancing before the morning gates of heaven?
+Or keeping watch among those starry seven,
+Old Atlas' children? Art a maid of the waters,
+One of shell-winding Triton's bright-hair'd daughters?
+Or art, impossible! a nymph of Dian's,
+Weaving a coronal of tender scions
+For very idleness? Where'er thou art,
+Methinks it now is at my will to start
+Into thine arms; to scare Aurora's train,
+And snatch thee from the morning; o'er the main
+To scud like a wild bird, and take thee off
+From thy sea-foamy cradle; or to doff
+Thy shepherd vest, and woo thee mid fresh leaves.
+No, no, too eagerly my soul deceives
+Its powerless self: I know this cannot be.
+O let me then by some sweet dreaming flee
+To her entrancements: hither sleep awhile!
+Hither most gentle sleep! and soothing foil
+For some few hours the coming solitude."
+Thus spake he, and that moment felt endued
+With power to dream deliciously; so wound
+Through a dim passage, searching till he found
+The smoothest mossy bed and deepest, where
+He threw himself, and just into the air
+Stretching his indolent arms, he took, O bliss!
+A naked waist: "Fair Cupid, whence is this?"
+A well-known voice sigh'd, "Sweetest, here am I!"
+At which soft ravishment, with doating cry
+They trembled to each other.--Helicon!
+O fountain'd hill! Old Homer's Helicon!
+That thou wouldst spout a little streamlet o'er
+These sorry pages; then the verse would soar
+And sing above this gentle pair, like lark
+Over his nested young: but all is dark
+Around thine aged top, and thy clear fount
+Exhales in mists to heaven. Aye, the count
+Of mighty Poets is made up; the scroll
+Is folded by the Muses; the bright roll
+Is in Apollo's hand: our dazed eyes
+Have seen a new tinge in the western skies:
+The world has done its duty. Yet, oh yet,
+Although the sun of poesy is set,
+These lovers did embrace, and we must weep
+That there is no old power left to steep
+A quill immortal in their joyous tears.
+Long time in silence did their anxious fears
+Question that thus it was; long time they lay
+Fondling and kissing every doubt away;
+Long time ere soft caressing sobs began
+To mellow into words, and then there ran
+Two bubbling springs of talk from their sweet lips.
+"O known Unknown! from whom my being sips
+Such darling essence, wherefore may I not
+Be ever in these arms? in this sweet spot
+Pillow my chin for ever? ever press
+These toying hands and kiss their smooth excess?
+Why not for ever and for ever feel
+That breath about my eyes? Ah, thou wilt steal
+Away from me again, indeed, indeed--
+Thou wilt be gone away, and wilt not heed
+My lonely madness. Speak, my kindest fair!
+Is--is it to be so? No! Who will dare
+To pluck thee from me? And, of thine own will,
+Full well I feel thou wouldst not leave me. Still
+Let me entwine thee surer, surer--now
+How can we part? Elysium! who art thou?
+Who, that thou canst not be for ever here,
+Or lift me with thee to some starry sphere?
+Enchantress! tell me by this soft embrace,
+By the most soft completion of thy face,
+Those lips, O slippery blisses, twinkling eyes,
+And by these tenderest, milky sovereignties--
+These tenderest, and by the nectar-wine,
+The passion"--------"O lov'd Ida the divine!
+Endymion! dearest! Ah, unhappy me!
+His soul will 'scape us--O felicity!
+How he does love me! His poor temples beat
+To the very tune of love--how sweet, sweet, sweet.
+Revive, dear youth, or I shall faint and die;
+Revive, or these soft hours will hurry by
+In tranced dulness; speak, and let that spell
+Affright this lethargy! I cannot quell
+Its heavy pressure, and will press at least
+My lips to thine, that they may richly feast
+Until we taste the life of love again.
+What! dost thou move? dost kiss? O bliss! O pain!
+I love thee, youth, more than I can conceive;
+And so long absence from thee doth bereave
+My soul of any rest: yet must I hence:
+Yet, can I not to starry eminence
+Uplift thee; nor for very shame can own
+Myself to thee. Ah, dearest, do not groan
+Or thou wilt force me from this secrecy,
+And I must blush in heaven. O that I
+Had done it already; that the dreadful smiles
+At my lost brightness, my impassion'd wiles,
+Had waned from Olympus' solemn height,
+And from all serious Gods; that our delight
+Was quite forgotten, save of us alone!
+And wherefore so ashamed? 'Tis but to atone
+For endless pleasure, by some coward blushes:
+Yet must I be a coward!--Horror rushes
+Too palpable before me--the sad look
+Of Jove--Minerva's start--no bosom shook
+With awe of purity--no Cupid pinion
+In reverence veiled--my crystaline dominion
+Half lost, and all old hymns made nullity!
+But what is this to love? O I could fly
+With thee into the ken of heavenly powers,
+So thou wouldst thus, for many sequent hours,
+Press me so sweetly. Now I swear at once
+That I am wise, that Pallas is a dunce--
+Perhaps her love like mine is but unknown--
+O I do think that I have been alone
+In chastity: yes, Pallas has been sighing,
+While every eve saw me my hair uptying
+With fingers cool as aspen leaves. Sweet love,
+I was as vague as solitary dove,
+Nor knew that nests were built. Now a soft kiss--
+Aye, by that kiss, I vow an endless bliss,
+An immortality of passion's thine:
+Ere long I will exalt thee to the shine
+Of heaven ambrosial; and we will shade
+Ourselves whole summers by a river glade;
+And I will tell thee stories of the sky,
+And breathe thee whispers of its minstrelsy.
+My happy love will overwing all bounds!
+O let me melt into thee; let the sounds
+Of our close voices marry at their birth;
+Let us entwine hoveringly--O dearth
+Of human words! roughness of mortal speech!
+Lispings empyrean will I sometime teach
+Thine honied tongue--lute-breathings, which I gasp
+To have thee understand, now while I clasp
+Thee thus, and weep for fondness--I am pain'd,
+Endymion: woe! woe! is grief contain'd
+In the very deeps of pleasure, my sole life?"--
+Hereat, with many sobs, her gentle strife
+Melted into a languor. He return'd
+Entranced vows and tears.
+Ye who have yearn'd
+With too much passion, will here stay and pity,
+For the mere sake of truth; as 'tis a ditty
+Not of these days, but long ago 'twas told
+By a cavern wind unto a forest old;
+And then the forest told it in a dream
+To a sleeping lake, whose cool and level gleam
+A poet caught as he was journeying
+To Phoebus' shrine; and in it he did fling
+His weary limbs, bathing an hour's space,
+And after, straight in that inspired place
+He sang the story up into the air,
+Giving it universal freedom. There
+Has it been ever sounding for those ears
+Whose tips are glowing hot. The legend cheers
+Yon centinel stars; and he who listens to it
+Must surely be self-doomed or he will rue it:
+For quenchless burnings come upon the heart,
+Made fiercer by a fear lest any part
+Should be engulphed in the eddying wind.
+As much as here is penn'd doth always find
+A resting place, thus much comes clear and plain;
+Anon the strange voice is upon the wane--
+And 'tis but echo'd from departing sound,
+That the fair visitant at last unwound
+Her gentle limbs, and left the youth asleep.--
+Thus the tradition of the gusty deep.
+Now turn we to our former chroniclers.--
+Endymion awoke, that grief of hers
+Sweet paining on his ear: he sickly guess'd
+How lone he was once more, and sadly press'd
+His empty arms together, hung his head,
+And most forlorn upon that widow'd bed
+Sat silently. Love's madness he had known:
+Often with more than tortured lion's groan
+Moanings had burst from him; but now that rage
+Had pass'd away: no longer did he wage
+A rough-voic'd war against the dooming stars.
+No, he had felt too much for such harsh jars:
+The lyre of his soul Eolian tun'd
+Forgot all violence, and but commun'd
+With melancholy thought: O he had swoon'd
+Drunken from pleasure's nipple; and his love
+Henceforth was dove-like.--Loth was he to move
+From the imprinted couch, and when he did,
+'Twas with slow, languid paces, and face hid
+In muffling hands. So temper'd, out he stray'd
+Half seeing visions that might have dismay'd
+Alecto's serpents; ravishments more keen
+Than Hermes' pipe, when anxious he did lean
+Over eclipsing eyes: and at the last
+It was a sounding grotto, vaulted, vast,
+O'er studded with a thousand, thousand pearls,
+And crimson mouthed shells with stubborn curls,
+Of every shape and size, even to the bulk
+In which whales arbour close, to brood and sulk
+Against an endless storm. Moreover too,
+Fish-semblances, of green and azure hue,
+Ready to snort their streams. In this cool wonder
+Endymion sat down, and 'gan to ponder
+On all his life: his youth, up to the day
+When 'mid acclaim, and feasts, and garlands gay,
+He stept upon his shepherd throne: the look
+Of his white palace in wild forest nook,
+And all the revels he had lorded there:
+Each tender maiden whom he once thought fair,
+With every friend and fellow-woodlander--
+Pass'd like a dream before him. Then the spur
+Of the old bards to mighty deeds: his plans
+To nurse the golden age 'mong shepherd clans:
+That wondrous night: the great Pan-festival:
+His sister's sorrow; and his wanderings all,
+Until into the earth's deep maw he rush'd:
+Then all its buried magic, till it flush'd
+High with excessive love. "And now," thought he,
+"How long must I remain in jeopardy
+Of blank amazements that amaze no more?
+Now I have tasted her sweet soul to the core
+All other depths are shallow: essences,
+Once spiritual, are like muddy lees,
+Meant but to fertilize my earthly root,
+And make my branches lift a golden fruit
+Into the bloom of heaven: other light,
+Though it be quick and sharp enough to blight
+The Olympian eagle's vision, is dark,
+Dark as the parentage of chaos. Hark!
+My silent thoughts are echoing from these shells;
+Or they are but the ghosts, the dying swells
+Of noises far away?--list!"--Hereupon
+He kept an anxious ear. The humming tone
+Came louder, and behold, there as he lay,
+On either side outgush'd, with misty spray,
+A copious spring; and both together dash'd
+Swift, mad, fantastic round the rocks, and lash'd
+Among the conchs and shells of the lofty grot,
+Leaving a trickling dew. At last they shot
+Down from the ceiling's height, pouring a noise
+As of some breathless racers whose hopes poize
+Upon the last few steps, and with spent force
+Along the ground they took a winding course.
+Endymion follow'd--for it seem'd that one
+Ever pursued, the other strove to shun--
+Follow'd their languid mazes, till well nigh
+He had left thinking of the mystery,--
+And was now rapt in tender hoverings
+Over the vanish'd bliss. Ah! what is it sings
+His dream away? What melodies are these?
+They sound as through the whispering of trees,
+Not native in such barren vaults. Give ear!
+"O Arethusa, peerless nymph! why fear
+Such tenderness as mine? Great Dian, why,
+Why didst thou hear her prayer? O that I
+Were rippling round her dainty fairness now,
+Circling about her waist, and striving how
+To entice her to a dive! then stealing in
+Between her luscious lips and eyelids thin.
+O that her shining hair was in the sun,
+And I distilling from it thence to run
+In amorous rillets down her shrinking form!
+To linger on her lily shoulders, warm
+Between her kissing breasts, and every charm
+Touch raptur'd!--See how painfully I flow:
+Fair maid, be pitiful to my great woe.
+Stay, stay thy weary course, and let me lead,
+A happy wooer, to the flowery mead
+Where all that beauty snar'd me."--"Cruel god,
+Desist! or my offended mistress' nod
+Will stagnate all thy fountains:--tease me not
+With syren words--Ah, have I really got
+Such power to madden thee? And is it true--
+Away, away, or I shall dearly rue
+My very thoughts: in mercy then away,
+Kindest Alpheus for should I obey
+My own dear will, 'twould be a deadly bane."--
+"O, Oread-Queen! would that thou hadst a pain
+Like this of mine, then would I fearless turn
+And be a criminal."--"Alas, I burn,
+I shudder--gentle river, get thee hence.
+Alpheus! thou enchanter! every sense
+Of mine was once made perfect in these woods.
+Fresh breezes, bowery lawns, and innocent floods,
+Ripe fruits, and lonely couch, contentment gave;
+But ever since I heedlessly did lave
+In thy deceitful stream, a panting glow
+Grew strong within me: wherefore serve me so,
+And call it love? Alas, 'twas cruelty.
+Not once more did I close my happy eyes
+Amid the thrush's song. Away! Avaunt!
+O 'twas a cruel thing."--"Now thou dost taunt
+So softly, Arethusa, that I think
+If thou wast playing on my shady brink,
+Thou wouldst bathe once again. Innocent maid!
+Stifle thine heart no more;--nor be afraid
+Of angry powers: there are deities
+Will shade us with their wings. Those fitful sighs
+'Tis almost death to hear: O let me pour
+A dewy balm upon them!--fear no more,
+Sweet Arethusa! Dian's self must feel
+Sometimes these very pangs. Dear maiden, steal
+Blushing into my soul, and let us fly
+These dreary caverns for the open sky.
+I will delight thee all my winding course,
+From the green sea up to my hidden source
+About Arcadian forests; and will shew
+The channels where my coolest waters flow
+Through mossy rocks; where, 'mid exuberant green,
+I roam in pleasant darkness, more unseen
+Than Saturn in his exile; where I brim
+Round flowery islands, and take thence a skim
+Of mealy sweets, which myriads of bees
+Buzz from their honied wings: and thou shouldst please
+Thyself to choose the richest, where we might
+Be incense-pillow'd every summer night.
+Doff all sad fears, thou white deliciousness,
+And let us be thus comforted; unless
+Thou couldst rejoice to see my hopeless stream
+Hurry distracted from Sol's temperate beam,
+And pour to death along some hungry sands."--
+"What can I do, Alpheus? Dian stands
+Severe before me: persecuting fate!
+Unhappy Arethusa! thou wast late
+A huntress free in"--At this, sudden fell
+Those two sad streams adown a fearful dell.
+The Latmian listen'd, but he heard no more,
+Save echo, faint repeating o'er and o'er
+The name of Arethusa. On the verge
+Of that dark gulph he wept, and said: "I urge
+Thee, gentle Goddess of my pilgrimage,
+By our eternal hopes, to soothe, to assuage,
+If thou art powerful, these lovers pains;
+And make them happy in some happy plains.
+He turn'd--there was a whelming sound--he stept,
+There was a cooler light; and so he kept
+Towards it by a sandy path, and lo!
+More suddenly than doth a moment go,
+The visions of the earth were gone and fled--
+He saw the giant sea above his head.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	50. O Blush Not So!	|	<poem>
+O blush not so! O blush not so!
+Or I shall think you knowing;
+And if you smile the blushing while,
+Then maidenheads are going.
+There's a blush for want, and a blush for shan't,
+And a blush for having done it;
+There's a blush for thought, and a blush for nought,
+And a blush for just begun it.
+O sigh not so! O sigh not so!
+For it sounds of Eve's sweet pippin;
+By these loosen'd lips you have tasted the pips
+And fought in an amorous nipping.
+Will you play once more at nice-cut-core,
+For it only will last our youth out,
+And we have the prime of the kissing time,
+We have not one sweet tooth out.
+There's a sigh for aye, and a sigh for nay,
+And a sigh for "I can't bear it!"
+O what can be done, shall we stay or run?
+O cut the sweet apple and share it!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	51. Where Be Ye Going, You Devon Maid?	|	<poem>
+Where be ye going, you Devon maid?
+And what have ye there i' the basket?
+Ye tight little fairy, just fresh from the dairy,
+Will ye give me some cream if I ask it?
+I love your meads, and I love your flowers,
+And I love your junkets mainly,
+But 'hind the door, I love kissing more,
+O look not so disdainly!
+I love your hills, and I love your dales,
+And I love your flocks a-bleating;
+But O, on the heather to lie together,
+With both our hearts a-beating!
+I'll put your basket all safe in a nook,
+Your shawl I'll hang up on this willow,
+And we will sigh in the daisy's eye,
+And kiss on a grass-green pillow.
+</poem>	++++
+++++	52. Isabella or The Pot of Basil	|	<poem>I.
+Fair Isabel, poor simple Isabel!
+Lorenzo, a young palmer in Love's eye!
+They could not in the self-same mansion dwell
+Without some stir of heart, some malady;
+They could not sit at meals but feel how well
+It soothed each to be the other by;
+They could not, sure, beneath the same roof sleep
+But to each other dream, and nightly weep.
+II.
+With every morn their love grew tenderer,
+With every eve deeper and tenderer still;
+He might not in house, field, or garden stir,
+But her full shape would all his seeing fill;
+And his continual voice was pleasanter
+To her, than noise of trees or hidden rill;
+Her lute-string gave an echo of his name,
+She spoilt her half-done broidery with the same.
+III.
+He knew whose gentle hand was at the latch,
+Before the door had given her to his eyes;
+And from her chamber-window he would catch
+Her beauty farther than the falcon spies;
+And constant as her vespers would he watch,
+Because her face was turn'd to the same skies;
+And with sick longing all the night outwear,
+To hear her morning-step upon the stair.
+IV.
+A whole long month of May in this sad plight
+Made their cheeks paler by the break of June:
+"To morrow will I bow to my delight,
+"To-morrow will I ask my lady's boon."--
+"O may I never see another night,
+"Lorenzo, if thy lips breathe not love's tune."--
+So spake they to their pillows; but, alas,
+Honeyless days and days did he let pass;
+V.
+Until sweet Isabella's untouch'd cheek
+Fell sick within the rose's just domain,
+Fell thin as a young mother's, who doth seek
+By every lull to cool her infant's pain:
+"How ill she is," said he, "I may not speak,
+"And yet I will, and tell my love all plain:
+"If looks speak love-laws, I will drink her tears,
+"And at the least 'twill startle off her cares."
+VI.
+So said he one fair morning, and all day
+His heart beat awfully against his side;
+And to his heart he inwardly did pray
+For power to speak; but still the ruddy tide
+Stifled his voice, and puls'd resolve away--
+Fever'd his high conceit of such a bride,
+Yet brought him to the meekness of a child:
+Alas! when passion is both meek and wild!
+VII.
+So once more he had wak'd and anguished
+A dreary night of love and misery,
+If Isabel's quick eye had not been wed
+To every symbol on his forehead high;
+She saw it waxing very pale and dead,
+And straight all flush'd; so, lisped tenderly,
+"Lorenzo!"--here she ceas'd her timid quest,
+But in her tone and look he read the rest.
+VIII.
+"O Isabella, I can half perceive
+"That I may speak my grief into thine ear;
+"If thou didst ever any thing believe,
+"Believe how I love thee, believe how near
+"My soul is to its doom: I would not grieve
+"Thy hand by unwelcome pressing, would not fear
+"Thine eyes by gazing; but I cannot live
+"Another night, and not my passion shrive.
+IX.
+"Love! thou art leading me from wintry cold,
+"Lady! thou leadest me to summer clime,
+"And I must taste the blossoms that unfold
+"In its ripe warmth this gracious morning time."
+So said, his erewhile timid lips grew bold,
+And poesied with hers in dewy rhyme:
+Great bliss was with them, and great happiness
+Grew, like a lusty flower in June's caress.
+X.
+Parting they seem'd to tread upon the air,
+Twin roses by the zephyr blown apart
+Only to meet again more close, and share
+The inward fragrance of each other's heart.
+She, to her chamber gone, a ditty fair
+Sang, of delicious love and honey'd dart;
+He with light steps went up a western hill,
+And bade the sun farewell, and joy'd his fill.
+XI.
+All close they met again, before the dusk
+Had taken from the stars its pleasant veil,
+All close they met, all eves, before the dusk
+Had taken from the stars its pleasant veil,
+Close in a bower of hyacinth and musk,
+Unknown of any, free from whispering tale.
+Ah! better had it been for ever so,
+Than idle ears should pleasure in their woe.
+XII.
+Were they unhappy then?--It cannot be--
+Too many tears for lovers have been shed,
+Too many sighs give we to them in fee,
+Too much of pity after they are dead,
+Too many doleful stories do we see,
+Whose matter in bright gold were best be read;
+Except in such a page where Theseus' spouse
+Over the pathless waves towards him bows.
+XIII.
+But, for the general award of love,
+The little sweet doth kill much bitterness;
+Though Dido silent is in under-grove,
+And Isabella's was a great distress,
+Though young Lorenzo in warm Indian clove
+Was not embalm'd, this truth is not the less--
+Even bees, the little almsmen of spring-bowers,
+Know there is richest juice in poison-flowers.
+XIV.
+With her two brothers this fair lady dwelt,
+Enriched from ancestral merchandize,
+And for them many a weary hand did swelt
+In torched mines and noisy factories,
+And many once proud-quiver'd loins did melt
+In blood from stinging whip;--with hollow eyes
+Many all day in dazzling river stood,
+To take the rich-ored driftings of the flood.
+XV.
+For them the Ceylon diver held his breath,
+And went all naked to the hungry shark;
+For them his ears gush'd blood; for them in death
+The seal on the cold ice with piteous bark
+Lay full of darts; for them alone did seethe
+A thousand men in troubles wide and dark:
+Half-ignorant, they turn'd an easy wheel,
+That set sharp racks at work, to pinch and peel.
+XVI.
+Why were they proud? Because their marble founts
+Gush'd with more pride than do a wretch's tears?--
+Why were they proud? Because fair orange-mounts
+Were of more soft ascent than lazar stairs?--
+Why were they proud? Because red-lin'd accounts
+Were richer than the songs of Grecian years?--
+Why were they proud? again we ask aloud,
+Why in the name of Glory were they proud?
+XVII.
+Yet were these Florentines as self-retired
+In hungry pride and gainful cowardice,
+As two close Hebrews in that land inspired,
+Paled in and vineyarded from beggar-spies,
+The hawks of ship-mast forests--the untired
+And pannier'd mules for ducats and old lies--
+Quick cat's-paws on the generous stray-away,--
+Great wits in Spanish, Tuscan, and Malay.
+XVIII.
+How was it these same ledger-men could spy
+Fair Isabella in her downy nest?
+How could they find out in Lorenzo's eye
+A straying from his toil? Hot Egypt's pest
+Into their vision covetous and sly!
+How could these money-bags see east and west?--
+Yet so they did--and every dealer fair
+Must see behind, as doth the hunted hare.
+XIX.
+O eloquent and famed Boccaccio!
+Of thee we now should ask forgiving boon,
+And of thy spicy myrtles as they blow,
+And of thy roses amorous of the moon,
+And of thy lilies, that do paler grow
+Now they can no more hear thy ghittern's tune,
+For venturing syllables that ill beseem
+The quiet glooms of such a piteous theme.
+XX.
+Grant thou a pardon here, and then the tale
+Shall move on soberly, as it is meet;
+There is no other crime, no mad assail
+To make old prose in modern rhyme more sweet:
+But it is done--succeed the verse or fail--
+To honour thee, and thy gone spirit greet;
+To stead thee as a verse in English tongue,
+An echo of thee in the north-wind sung.
+XXI.
+These brethren having found by many signs
+What love Lorenzo for their sister had,
+And how she lov'd him too, each unconfines
+His bitter thoughts to other, well nigh mad
+That he, the servant of their trade designs,
+Should in their sister's love be blithe and glad,
+When 'twas their plan to coax her by degrees
+To some high noble and his olive-trees.
+XXII.
+And many a jealous conference had they,
+And many times they bit their lips alone,
+Before they fix'd upon a surest way
+To make the youngster for his crime atone;
+And at the last, these men of cruel clay
+Cut Mercy with a sharp knife to the bone;
+For they resolved in some forest dim
+To kill Lorenzo, and there bury him.
+XXIII.
+So on a pleasant morning, as he leant
+Into the sun-rise, o'er the balustrade
+Of the garden-terrace, towards him they bent
+Their footing through the dews; and to him said,
+"You seem there in the quiet of content,
+"Lorenzo, and we are most loth to invade
+"Calm speculation; but if you are wise,
+"Bestride your steed while cold is in the skies.
+XXIV.
+"To-day we purpose, ay, this hour we mount
+"To spur three leagues towards the Apennine;
+"Come down, we pray thee, ere the hot sun count
+"His dewy rosary on the eglantine."
+Lorenzo, courteously as he was wont,
+Bow'd a fair greeting to these serpents' whine;
+And went in haste, to get in readiness,
+With belt, and spur, and bracing huntsman's dress.
+XXV.
+And as he to the court-yard pass'd along,
+Each third step did he pause, and listen'd oft
+If he could hear his lady's matin-song,
+Or the light whisper of her footstep soft;
+And as he thus over his passion hung,
+He heard a laugh full musical aloft;
+When, looking up, he saw her features bright
+Smile through an in-door lattice, all delight.
+XXVI.
+"Love, Isabel!" said he, "I was in pain
+"Lest I should miss to bid thee a good morrow:
+"Ah! what if I should lose thee, when so fain
+"I am to stifle all the heavy sorrow
+"Of a poor three hours' absence? but we'll gain
+"Out of the amorous dark what day doth borrow.
+"Good bye! I'll soon be back."--"Good bye!" said she:--
+And as he went she chanted merrily.
+XXVII.
+So the two brothers and their murder'd man
+Rode past fair Florence, to where Arno's stream
+Gurgles through straiten'd banks, and still doth fan
+Itself with dancing bulrush, and the bream
+Keeps head against the freshets. Sick and wan
+The brothers' faces in the ford did seem,
+Lorenzo's flush with love.--They pass'd the water
+Into a forest quiet for the slaughter.
+XXVIII.
+There was Lorenzo slain and buried in,
+There in that forest did his great love cease;
+Ah! when a soul doth thus its freedom win,
+It aches in loneliness--is ill at peace
+As the break-covert blood-hounds of such sin:
+They dipp'd their swords in the water, and did tease
+Their horses homeward, with convulsed spur,
+Each richer by his being a murderer.
+XXIX.
+They told their sister how, with sudden speed,
+Lorenzo had ta'en ship for foreign lands,
+Because of some great urgency and need
+In their affairs, requiring trusty hands.
+Poor Girl! put on thy stifling widow's weed,
+And 'scape at once from Hope's accursed bands;
+To-day thou wilt not see him, nor to-morrow,
+And the next day will be a day of sorrow.
+XXX.
+She weeps alone for pleasures not to be;
+Sorely she wept until the night came on,
+And then, instead of love, O misery!
+She brooded o'er the luxury alone:
+His image in the dusk she seem'd to see,
+And to the silence made a gentle moan,
+Spreading her perfect arms upon the air,
+And on her couch low murmuring, "Where? O where?"
+XXXI.
+But Selfishness, Love's cousin, held not long
+Its fiery vigil in her single breast;
+She fretted for the golden hour, and hung
+Upon the time with feverish unrest--
+Not long--for soon into her heart a throng
+Of higher occupants, a richer zest,
+Came tragic; passion not to be subdued,
+And sorrow for her love in travels rude.
+XXXII.
+In the mid days of autumn, on their eves
+The breath of Winter comes from far away,
+And the sick west continually bereaves
+Of some gold tinge, and plays a roundelay
+Of death among the bushes and the leaves,
+To make all bare before he dares to stray
+From his north cavern. So sweet Isabel
+By gradual decay from beauty fell,
+XXXIII.
+Because Lorenzo came not. Oftentimes
+She ask'd her brothers, with an eye all pale,
+Striving to be itself, what dungeon climes
+Could keep him off so long? They spake a tale
+Time after time, to quiet her. Their crimes
+Came on them, like a smoke from Hinnom's vale;
+And every night in dreams they groan'd aloud,
+To see their sister in her snowy shroud.
+XXXIV.
+And she had died in drowsy ignorance,
+But for a thing more deadly dark than all;
+It came like a fierce potion, drunk by chance,
+Which saves a sick man from the feather'd pall
+For some few gasping moments; like a lance,
+Waking an Indian from his cloudy hall
+With cruel pierce, and bringing him again
+Sense of the gnawing fire at heart and brain.
+XXXV.
+It was a vision.--In the drowsy gloom,
+The dull of midnight, at her couch's foot
+Lorenzo stood, and wept: the forest tomb
+Had marr'd his glossy hair which once could shoot
+Lustre into the sun, and put cold doom
+Upon his lips, and taken the soft lute
+From his lorn voice, and past his loamed ears
+Had made a miry channel for his tears.
+XXXVI.
+Strange sound it was, when the pale shadow spake;
+For there was striving, in its piteous tongue,
+To speak as when on earth it was awake,
+And Isabella on its music hung:
+Languor there was in it, and tremulous shake,
+As in a palsied Druid's harp unstrung;
+And through it moan'd a ghostly under-song,
+Like hoarse night-gusts sepulchral briars among.
+XXXVII.
+Its eyes, though wild, were still all dewy bright
+With love, and kept all phantom fear aloof
+From the poor girl by magic of their light,
+The while it did unthread the horrid woof
+Of the late darken'd time,--the murderous spite
+Of pride and avarice,--the dark pine roof
+In the forest,--and the sodden turfed dell,
+Where, without any word, from stabs he fell.
+XXXVIII.
+Saying moreover, "Isabel, my sweet!
+"Red whortle-berries droop above my head,
+"And a large flint-stone weighs upon my feet;
+"Around me beeches and high chestnuts shed
+"Their leaves and prickly nuts; a sheep-fold bleat
+"Comes from beyond the river to my bed:
+"Go, shed one tear upon my heather-bloom,
+"And it shall comfort me within the tomb.
+XXXIX.
+"I am a shadow now, alas! alas!
+"Upon the skirts of human-nature dwelling
+"Alone: I chant alone the holy mass,
+"While little sounds of life are round me knelling,
+"And glossy bees at noon do fieldward pass,
+"And many a chapel bell the hour is telling,
+"Paining me through: those sounds grow strange to me,
+"And thou art distant in Humanity.
+XL.
+"I know what was, I feel full well what is,
+"And I should rage, if spirits could go mad;
+"Though I forget the taste of earthly bliss,
+"That paleness warms my grave, as though I had
+"A Seraph chosen from the bright abyss
+"To be my spouse: thy paleness makes me glad;
+"Thy beauty grows upon me, and I feel
+"A greater love through all my essence steal."
+XLI.
+The Spirit mourn'd "Adieu!"--dissolv'd, and left
+The atom darkness in a slow turmoil;
+As when of healthful midnight sleep bereft,
+Thinking on rugged hours and fruitless toil,
+We put our eyes into a pillowy cleft,
+And see the spangly gloom froth up and boil:
+It made sad Isabella's eyelids ache,
+And in the dawn she started up awake;
+XLII.
+"Ha! ha!" said she, "I knew not this hard life,
+"I thought the worst was simple misery;
+"I thought some Fate with pleasure or with strife
+"Portion'd us--happy days, or else to die;
+"But there is crime--a brother's bloody knife!
+"Sweet Spirit, thou hast school'd my infancy:
+"I'll visit thee for this, and kiss thine eyes,
+"And greet thee morn and even in the skies."
+XLIII.
+When the full morning came, she had devised
+How she might secret to the forest hie;
+How she might find the clay, so dearly prized,
+And sing to it one latest lullaby;
+How her short absence might be unsurmised,
+While she the inmost of the dream would try.
+Resolv'd, she took with her an aged nurse,
+And went into that dismal forest-hearse.
+XLIV.
+See, as they creep along the river side,
+How she doth whisper to that aged Dame,
+And, after looking round the champaign wide,
+Shows her a knife.--"What feverous hectic flame
+"Burns in thee, child?--What good can thee betide,
+"That thou should'st smile again?"--The evening came,
+And they had found Lorenzo's earthy bed;
+The flint was there, the berries at his head.
+XLV.
+Who hath not loiter'd in a green church-yard,
+And let his spirit, like a demon-mole,
+Work through the clayey soil and gravel hard,
+To see skull, coffin'd bones, and funeral stole;
+Pitying each form that hungry Death hath marr'd,
+And filling it once more with human soul?
+Ah! this is holiday to what was felt
+When Isabella by Lorenzo knelt.
+XLVI.
+She gaz'd into the fresh-thrown mould, as though
+One glance did fully all its secrets tell;
+Clearly she saw, as other eyes would know
+Pale limbs at bottom of a crystal well;
+Upon the murderous spot she seem'd to grow,
+Like to a native lily of the dell:
+Then with her knife, all sudden, she began
+To dig more fervently than misers can.
+XLVII.
+Soon she turn'd up a soiled glove, whereon
+Her silk had play'd in purple phantasies,
+She kiss'd it with a lip more chill than stone,
+And put it in her bosom, where it dries
+And freezes utterly unto the bone
+Those dainties made to still an infant's cries:
+Then 'gan she work again; nor stay'd her care,
+But to throw back at times her veiling hair.
+XLVIII.
+That old nurse stood beside her wondering,
+Until her heart felt pity to the core
+At sight of such a dismal labouring,
+And so she kneeled, with her locks all hoar,
+And put her lean hands to the horrid thing:
+Three hours they labour'd at this travail sore;
+At last they felt the kernel of the grave,
+And Isabella did not stamp and rave.
+XLIX.
+Ah! wherefore all this wormy circumstance?
+Why linger at the yawning tomb so long?
+O for the gentleness of old Romance,
+The simple plaining of a minstrel's song!
+Fair reader, at the old tale take a glance,
+For here, in truth, it doth not well belong
+To speak:--O turn thee to the very tale,
+And taste the music of that vision pale.
+L.
+With duller steel than the Persиan sword
+They cut away no formless monster's head,
+But one, whose gentleness did well accord
+With death, as life. The ancient harps have said,
+Love never dies, but lives, immortal Lord:
+If Love impersonate was ever dead,
+Pale Isabella kiss'd it, and low moan'd.
+'Twas love; cold,--dead indeed, but not dethroned.
+LI.
+In anxious secrecy they took it home,
+And then the prize was all for Isabel:
+She calm'd its wild hair with a golden comb,
+And all around each eye's sepulchral cell
+Pointed each fringed lash; the smeared loam
+With tears, as chilly as a dripping well,
+She drench'd away:--and still she comb'd, and kept
+Sighing all day--and still she kiss'd, and wept.
+LII.
+Then in a silken scarf,--sweet with the dews
+Of precious flowers pluck'd in Araby,
+And divine liquids come with odorous ooze
+Through the cold serpent pipe refreshfully,--
+She wrapp'd it up; and for its tomb did choose
+A garden-pot, wherein she laid it by,
+And cover'd it with mould, and o'er it set
+Sweet Basil, which her tears kept ever wet.
+LIII.
+And she forgot the stars, the moon, and sun,
+And she forgot the blue above the trees,
+And she forgot the dells where waters run,
+And she forgot the chilly autumn breeze;
+She had no knowledge when the day was done,
+And the new morn she saw not: but in peace
+Hung over her sweet Basil evermore,
+And moisten'd it with tears unto the core.
+LIV.
+And so she ever fed it with thin tears,
+Whence thick, and green, and beautiful it grew,
+So that it smelt more balmy than its peers
+Of Basil-tufts in Florence; for it drew
+Nurture besides, and life, from human fears,
+From the fast mouldering head there shut from view:
+So that the jewel, safely casketed,
+Came forth, and in perfumed leafits spread.
+LV.
+O Melancholy, linger here awhile!
+O Music, Music, breathe despondingly!
+O Echo, Echo, from some sombre isle,
+Unknown, Lethean, sigh to us--O sigh!
+Spirits in grief, lift up your heads, and smile;
+Lift up your heads, sweet Spirits, heavily,
+And make a pale light in your cypress glooms,
+Tinting with silver wan your marble tombs.
+LVI.
+Moan hither, all ye syllables of woe,
+From the deep throat of sad Melpomene!
+Through bronzed lyre in tragic order go,
+And touch the strings into a mystery;
+Sound mournfully upon the winds and low;
+For simple Isabel is soon to be
+Among the dead: She withers, like a palm
+Cut by an Indian for its juicy balm.
+LVII.
+O leave the palm to wither by itself;
+Let not quick Winter chill its dying hour!--
+It may not be--those Baalites of pelf,
+Her brethren, noted the continual shower
+From her dead eyes; and many a curious elf,
+Among her kindred, wonder'd that such dower
+Of youth and beauty should be thrown aside
+By one mark'd out to be a Noble's bride.
+LVIII.
+And, furthermore, her brethren wonder'd much
+Why she sat drooping by the Basil green,
+And why it flourish'd, as by magic touch;
+Greatly they wonder'd what the thing might mean:
+They could not surely give belief, that such
+A very nothing would have power to wean
+Her from her own fair youth, and pleasures gay,
+And even remembrance of her love's delay.
+LIX.
+Therefore they watch'd a time when they might sift
+This hidden whim; and long they watch'd in vain;
+For seldom did she go to chapel-shrift,
+And seldom felt she any hunger-pain;
+And when she left, she hurried back, as swift
+As bird on wing to breast its eggs again;
+And, patient as a hen-bird, sat her there
+Beside her Basil, weeping through her hair.
+LX.
+Yet they contriv'd to steal the Basil-pot,
+And to examine it in secret place:
+The thing was vile with green and livid spot,
+And yet they knew it was Lorenzo's face:
+The guerdon of their murder they had got,
+And so left Florence in a moment's space,
+Never to turn again.--Away they went,
+With blood upon their heads, to banishment.
+LXI.
+O Melancholy, turn thine eyes away!
+O Music, Music, breathe despondingly!
+O Echo, Echo, on some other day,
+From isles Lethean, sigh to us--O sigh!
+Spirits of grief, sing not your "Well-a-way!"
+For Isabel, sweet Isabel, will die;
+Will die a death too lone and incomplete,
+Now they have ta'en away her Basil sweet.
+LXII.
+Piteous she look'd on dead and senseless things,
+Asking for her lost Basil amorously:
+And with melodious chuckle in the strings
+Of her lorn voice, she oftentimes would cry
+After the Pilgrim in his wanderings,
+To ask him where her Basil was; and why
+'Twas hid from her: "For cruel 'tis," said she,
+"To steal my Basil-pot away from me."
+LXIII.
+And so she pined, and so she died forlorn,
+Imploring for her Basil to the last.
+No heart was there in Florence but did mourn
+In pity of her love, so overcast.
+And a sad ditty of this story born
+From mouth to mouth through all the country pass'd:
+Still is the burthen sung--"O cruelty,
+"To steal my Basil-pot away from me!"
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	53. To—	|	<poem>
+Had I a man's fair form, then might my sighs
+Be echoed swiftly through that ivory shell,
+Thine ear, and find thy gentle heart; so well
+Would passion arm me for the enterprise:
+But ah! I am no knight whose foeman dies;
+No cuirass glistens on my bosom's swell;
+I am no happy shepherd of the dell
+Whose lips have trembled with a maiden's eyes.
+Yet must I dote upon thee,—call thee sweet,
+Sweeter by far than Hybla's honied roses
+When steeped in dew rich to intoxication.
+Ah! I will taste that dew, for me 'tis meet,
+And when the moon her pallid face discloses,
+I'll gather some by spells, and incantation.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	54. To Homer	|	<poem>
+Standing aloof in giant ignorance,
+Of thee I hear and of the Cyclades,
+As one who sits ashore and longs perchance
+To visit dolphin-coral in deep seas.
+So thou wast blind;--but then the veil was rent,
+For Jove uncurtain'd Heaven to let thee live,
+And Neptune made for thee a spumy tent,
+And Pan made sing for thee his forest-hive;
+Aye on the shores of darkness there is light,
+And precipices show untrodden green,
+There is a budding morrow in midnight,
+There is a triple sight in blindness keen;
+Such seeing hadst thou, as it once befel
+To Dian, Queen of Earth, and Heaven, and Hell.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	55. Answer To A Sonnet By J.H.Reynolds	|	<poem>
+"Dark eyes are dearer far
+Than those that mock the hyacinthine bell."
+Blue! 'Tis the life of heaven,—the domain
+Of Cynthia,—the wide palace of the sun,—
+The tent of Hesperus, and all his train,—
+The bosomer of clouds, gold, gray, and dun.
+Blue! 'Tis the life of waters:—Ocean
+And all its vassal streams, pools numberless,
+May rage, and foam, and fret, but never can
+Subside, if not to dark-blue nativeness.
+Blue! gentle cousin of the forest-green,
+Married to green in all the sweetest flowers—
+Forget-me-not,—the blue-bell,—and, that queen
+Of secrecy, the violet: what strange powers
+Hast thou, as a mere shadow! But how great,
+When in an Eye thou art alive with fate!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	56. Written On The Day That Mr Leigh Hunt Left Prison	|	<poem>
+What though, for showing truth to flattered state,
+Kind Hunt was shut in prison, yet has he,
+In his immortal spirit, been as free
+As the sky-searching lark, and as elate.
+Minion of grandeur! think you he did wait?
+Think you he nought but prison-walls did see,
+Till, so unwilling, thou unturnedst the key?
+Ah, no! far happier, nobler was his fate!
+In Spenser's halls he strayed, and bowers fair,
+Culling enchanted flowers; and he flew
+With daring Milton through the fields of air:
+To regions of his own his genius true
+Took happy flights. Who shall his fame impair
+When thou art dead, and all thy wretched crew?
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	57. Lines On The Mermaid Tavern	|	<poem>
+Souls of Poets dead and gone,
+What Elysium have ye known,
+Happy field or mossy cavern,
+Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern?
+Have ye tippled drink more fine
+Than mine host's Canary wine?
+Or are fruits of Paradise
+Sweeter than those dainty pies
+Of venison? O generous food!
+Drest as though bold Robin Hood
+Would, with his maid Marian,
+Sup and bowse from horn and can.
+I have heard that on a day
+Mine host's sign-board flew away,
+Nobody knew whither, till
+An astrologer's old quill
+To a sheepskin gave the story,
+Said he saw you in your glory,
+Underneath a new old sign
+Sipping beverage divine,
+And pledging with contented smack
+The Mermaid in the Zodiac.
+Souls of Poets dead and gone,
+What Elysium have ye known,
+Happy field or mossy cavern,
+Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern?
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	58. To One Who Has Been Long In City Pent	|	<poem>
+To one who has been long in city pent,
+'Tis very sweet to look into the fair
+And open face of heaven,--to breathe a prayer
+Full in the smile of the blue firmament.
+Who is more happy, when, with heart's content,
+Fatigued he sinks into some pleasant lair
+Of wavy grass, and reads a debonair
+And gentle tale of love and languishment?
+Returning home at evening, with an ear
+Catching the notes of Philomel,--an eye
+Watching the sailing cloudlet's bright career,
+He mourns that day so soon has glided by:
+E'en like the passage of an angel's tear
+That falls through the clear ether silently.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	59. This Living Hand	|	<poem>
+This living hand, now warm and capable
+Of earnest grasping, would, if it were cold
+And in the icy silence of the tomb,
+So haunt thy days and chill thy dreaming nights
+That thou wouldst wish thine own heart dry of blood
+So in my veins red life might stream again,
+And thou be conscience-calmed - see here it is -
+I hold it towards you.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	60. A Thing of Beauty (Endymion)	|	<poem>
+A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
+Its lovliness increases; it will never
+Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
+A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
+Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
+Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
+A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
+Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
+Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
+Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkn'd ways
+Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,
+Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
+From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,
+Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
+For simple sheep; and such are daffodils
+With the green world they live in; and clear rills
+That for themselves a cooling covert make
+'Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest brake,
+Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:
+And such too is the grandeur of the dooms
+We have imagined for the mighty dead;
+An endless fountain of immortal drink,
+Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	61. How Many Bards Gild The Lapses Of Time!	|	<poem>
+How many bards gild the lapses of time!
+A few of them have ever been the food
+Of my delighted fancy,—I could brood
+Over their beauties, earthly, or sublime:
+And often, when I sit me down to rhyme,
+These will in throngs before my mind intrude:
+But no confusion, no disturbance rude
+Do they occasion; 'tis a pleasing chime.
+So the unnumbered sounds that evening store;
+The songs of birds—the whispering of the leaves—
+The voice of waters—the great bell that heaves
+With solemn sound,—and thousand others more,
+That distance of recognizance bereaves,
+Makes pleasing music, and not wild uproar.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	62. To John Hamilton Reynolds	|	<poem>
+O that a week could be an age, and we
+Felt parting and warm meeting every week,
+Then one poor year a thousand years would be,
+The flush of welcome ever on the cheek:
+So could we live long life in little space,
+So time itself would be annihilate,
+So a day's journey in oblivious haze
+To serve ourjoys would lengthen and dilate.
+O to arrive each Monday morn from Ind!
+To land each Tuesday from the rich Levant!
+In little time a host of joys to bind,
+And keep our souls in one eternal pant!
+This morn, my friend, and yester-evening taught
+Me how to harbour such a happy thought.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	63. To Ailsa Rock	|	<poem>
+Hearken, thou craggy ocean-pyramid,
+Give answer by thy voice—the sea-fowls' screams!
+When were thy shoulders mantled in huge streams?
+When from the sun was thy broad forehead hid?
+How long is't since the mighty Power bid
+Thee heave to airy sleep from fathom dreams—
+Sleep in the lap of thunder or sunbeams—
+Or when grey clouds are thy cold coverlid!
+Thou answer'st not; for thou art dead asleep.
+Thy life is but two dead eternities,
+The last in air, the former in the deep!
+First with the whales, last with the eagle-skies!
+Drowned wast thou till an earthquake made thee steep,
+Another cannot wake thy giant-size!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	64. Written Before Re-Reading King Lear	|	<poem>
+O golden-tongued Romance with serene lute!
+Fair plumed Syren! Queen of far away!
+Leave melodizing on this wintry day,
+Shut up thine olden pages, and be mute.
+Adieu! for once again the fierce dispute
+Betwixt damnation and impassioned clay
+Must I burn through; once more humbly assay
+The bitter-sweet of this Shakespearian fruit.
+Chief Poet! and ye clouds of Albion,
+Begetters of our deep eternal theme,
+When through the old oak Forest I am gone,
+Let me not wander in a barren dream,
+But when I am consumed in the Fire,
+Give me new Phoenix wings to fly at my desire.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	65. Written On A Blank Space At The End Of Chaucer's Tale Of The Flowre And The Lefe	|	<poem>
+This pleasant tale is like a little copse:
+The honied lines so freshly interlace,
+To keep the reader in so sweet a place,
+So that he here and there full-hearted stops;
+And oftentimes he feels the dewy drops
+Come cool and suddenly against his face,
+And, by the wandering melody, may trace
+Which way the tender-legged linnet hops.
+Oh! what a power has white Simplicity!
+What mighty power has this gentle story!
+I, that do ever feel athirst for glory,
+Could at this moment be content to lie
+Meekly upon the grass, as those whose sobbings
+Were heard of none beside the mournful robins.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	66. Written On A Blank Space At The End Of Chaucer's Tale Of The Flowre And The Lefe	|	<poem>
+This pleasant tale is like a little copse:
+The honied lines so freshly interlace,
+To keep the reader in so sweet a place,
+So that he here and there full-hearted stops;
+And oftentimes he feels the dewy drops
+Come cool and suddenly against his face,
+And, by the wandering melody, may trace
+Which way the tender-legged linnet hops.
+Oh! what a power has white Simplicity!
+What mighty power has this gentle story!
+I, that do ever feel athirst for glory,
+Could at this moment be content to lie
+Meekly upon the grass, as those whose sobbings
+Were heard of none beside the mournful robins.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	67. To Haydon	|	<poem>
+Haydon! forgive me that I cannot speak
+Definitively of these mighty things;
+Forgive me, that I have not eagle's wings,
+That what I want I know not where to seek,
+And think that I would not be over-meek,
+In rolling out upfollowed thunderings,
+Even to the steep of Heliconian springs,
+Were I of ample strength for such a freak.
+Think, too, that all these numbers should be thine;
+Whose else? In this who touch thy vesture's hem?
+For, when men stared at what was most divine
+With brainless idiotism and o'erwise phlegm,
+Thou hadst beheld the full Hesperian shine
+Of their star in the east, and gone to worship them!
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	68. To G.A.W.	|	<poem>
+Nymph of the downward smile and sidelong glance!
+In what diviner moments of the day
+Art thou most lovely?—when gone far astray
+Into the labyrinths of sweet utterance,
+Or when serenely wandering in a trance
+Of sober thought? Or when starting away,
+With careless robe to meet the morning ray,
+Thou sparest the flowers in thy mazy dance?
+Haply 'tis when thy ruby lips part sweetly,
+And so remain, because thou listenest:
+But thou to please wert nurtured so completely
+That I can never tell what mood is best;
+I shall as soon pronounce which Grace more neatly
+Trips it before Apollo than the rest.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	69. Give Me Women, Wine, and Snuff	|	<poem>
+GIVE me women, wine, and snuff
+Untill I cry out "hold, enough!"
+You may do so sans objection
+Till the day of resurrection:
+For, bless my beard, they aye shall be
+My beloved Trinity.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	70. His Last Sonnet	|	<poem>
+Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art! -
+Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night,
+And watching, with eternal lids apart,
+Like Nature's patient sleepless Eremite,
+The moving waters at their priestlike task
+Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
+Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask
+Of snow upon the mountains and the moors -
+No -yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,
+Pillowed upon my fair love's ripening breast,
+To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
+Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
+Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
+And so live ever -or else swoon to death.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	71. Last Sonnet	|	<poem>
+BRIGHT Star, would I were steadfast as thou art--
+Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night,
+And watching, with eternal lids apart,
+Like Nature's patient sleepless Eremite,
+The moving waters at their priest-like task
+Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
+Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
+Of snow upon the mountains and the moors--
+No--yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,
+Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
+To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
+Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
+Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
+And so live ever--or else swoon to death.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	72. Fancy	|	<poem>
+Ever let the Fancy roam,
+Pleasure never is at home:
+At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,
+Like to bubbles when rain pelteth;
+Then let winged Fancy wander
+Through the thought still spread beyond her:
+Open wide the mind's cage-door,
+She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar.
+O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
+Summer's joys are spoilt by use,
+And the enjoying of the Spring
+Fades as does its blossoming;
+Autumn's red-lipp'd fruitage too,
+Blushing through the mist and dew,
+Cloys with tasting: What do then?
+Sit thee by the ingle, when
+The sear faggot blazes bright,
+Spirit of a winter's night;
+When the soundless earth is muffled,
+And the caked snow is shuffled
+From the ploughboy's heavy shoon;
+When the Night doth meet the Noon
+In a dark conspiracy
+To banish Even from her sky.
+Sit thee there, and send abroad,
+With a mind self-overaw'd,
+Fancy, high-commission'd:--send her!
+She has vassals to attend her:
+She will bring, in spite of frost,
+Beauties that the earth hath lost;
+She will bring thee, all together,
+All delights of summer weather;
+All the buds and bells of May,
+From dewy sward or thorny spray;
+All the heaped Autumn's wealth,
+With a still, mysterious stealth:
+She will mix these pleasures up
+Like three fit wines in a cup,
+And thou shalt quaff it:--thou shalt hear
+Distant harvest-carols clear;
+Rustle of the reaped corn;
+Sweet birds antheming the morn:
+And, in the same moment, hark!
+'Tis the early April lark,
+Or the rooks, with busy caw,
+Foraging for sticks and straw.
+Thou shalt, at one glance, behold
+The daisy and the marigold;
+White-plum'd lillies, and the first
+Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst;
+Shaded hyacinth, alway
+Sapphire queen of the mid-May;
+And every leaf, and every flower
+Pearled with the self-same shower.
+Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep
+Meagre from its celled sleep;
+And the snake all winter-thin
+Cast on sunny bank its skin;
+Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see
+Hatching in the hawthorn-tree,
+When the hen-bird's wing doth rest
+Quiet on her mossy nest;
+Then the hurry and alarm
+When the bee-hive casts its swarm;
+Acorns ripe down-pattering,
+While the autumn breezes sing.
+Oh, sweet Fancy! let her loose;
+Every thing is spoilt by use:
+Where's the cheek that doth not fade,
+Too much gaz'd at? Where's the maid
+Whose lip mature is ever new?
+Where's the eye, however blue,
+Doth not weary? Where's the face
+One would meet in every place?
+Where's the voice, however soft,
+One would hear so very oft?
+At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth
+Like to bubbles when rain pelteth.
+Let, then, winged Fancy find
+Thee a mistress to thy mind:
+Dulcet-ey'd as Ceres' daughter,
+Ere the God of Torment taught her
+How to frown and how to chide;
+With a waist and with a side
+White as Hebe's, when her zone
+Slipt its golden clasp, and down
+Fell her kirtle to her feet,
+While she held the goblet sweet
+And Jove grew languid.--Break the mesh
+Of the Fancy's silken leash;
+Quickly break her prison-string
+And such joys as these she'll bring.--
+Let the winged Fancy roam,
+Pleasure never is at home.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	73. Fill For Me A Brimming Bowl	|	<poem>
+Fill for me a brimming bowl
+And in it let me drown my soul:
+But put therein some drug, designed
+To Banish Women from my mind:
+For I want not the stream inspiring
+That fills the mind with--fond desiring,
+But I want as deep a draught
+As e'er from Lethe's wave was quaff'd;
+From my despairing heart to charm
+The Image of the fairest form
+That e'er my reveling eyes beheld,
+That e'er my wandering fancy spell'd.
+In vain! away I cannot chace
+The melting softness of that face,
+The beaminess of those bright eyes,
+That breast--earth's only Paradise.
+My sight will never more be blest;
+For all I see has lost its zest:
+Nor with delight can I explore,
+The Classic page, or Muse's lore.
+Had she but known how beat my heart,
+And with one smile reliev'd its smart
+I should have felt a sweet relief,
+I should have felt ``the joy of grief.''
+Yet as the Tuscan mid the snow
+Of Lapland dreams on sweet Arno,
+Even so for ever shall she be
+The Halo of my Memory.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	74. To Byron	|	<poem>
+Byron! how sweetly sad thy melody!
+Attuning still the soul to tenderness,
+As if soft Pity, with unusual stress,
+Had touch'd her plaintive lute, and thou, being by,
+Hadst caught the tones, nor suffer'd them to die.
+O'ershadowing sorrow doth not make thee less
+Delightful: thou thy griefs dost dress
+With a bright halo, shining beamily,
+As when a cloud the golden moon doth veil,
+Its sides are ting'd with a resplendent glow,
+Through the dark robe oft amber rays prevail,
+And like fair veins in sable marble flow;
+Still warble, dying swan! still tell the tale,
+The enchanting tale, the tale of pleasing woe.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	75. Ode to Fanny	|	<poem>
+Physician Nature! Let my spirit blood!
+O ease my heart of verse and let me rest;
+Throw me upon thy Tripod, till the flood
+Of stifling numbers ebbs from my full breast.
+A theme! a theme! great nature! give a theme;
+Let me begin my dream.
+I come -- I see thee, as thou standest there,
+Beckon me not into the wintry air.
+Ah! dearest love, sweet home of all my fears,
+And hopes, and joys, and panting miseries, --
+To-night, if I may guess, thy beauty wears
+A smile of such delight,
+As brilliant and as bright,
+As when with ravished, aching, vassal eyes,
+Lost in soft amaze,
+I gaze, I gaze!
+Who now, with greedy looks, eats up my feast?
+What stare outfaces now my silver moon!
+Ah! keep that hand unravished at the least;
+Let, let, the amorous burn --
+But pr'ythee, do not turn
+The current of your heart from me so soon.
+O! save, in charity,
+The quickest pulse for me.
+Save it for me, sweet love! though music breathe
+Voluptuous visions into the warm air;
+Though swimming through the dance's dangerous wreath,
+Be like an April day,
+Smiling and cold and gay,
+A temperate lilly, temperate as fair;
+Then, Heaven! there will be
+A warmer June for me.
+Why, this, you'll say, my Fanny! is not true:
+Put your soft hand upon your snowy side,
+Where the heart beats: confess -- 'tis nothing new --
+Must not a woman be
+A feather on the sea,
+Sway'd to and fro by every wind and tide?
+Of as uncertain speed
+As blow-ball from the mead?
+I know it -- and to know it is despair
+To one who loves you as I love, sweet Fanny!
+Whose heart goes fluttering for you every where,
+Nor, when away you roam,
+Dare keep its wretched home,
+Love, love alone, his pains severe and many:
+Then, loveliest! keep me free,
+From torturing jealousy.
+Ah! if you prize my subdued soul above
+The poor, the fading, brief, pride of an hour;
+Let none profane my Holy See of love,
+Or with a rude hand break
+The sacramental cake:
+Let none else touch the just new-budded flower;
+If not -- may my eyes close,
+Love! on their lost repose.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	76. Where's the Poet?	|	<poem>
+Where's the Poet? show him! show him,
+Muses nine! that I may know him.
+'Tis the man who with a man
+Is an equal, be he King,
+Or poorest of the beggar-clan
+Or any other wonderous thing
+A man may be 'twixt ape and Plato;
+'Tis the man who with a bird,
+Wren or Eagle, finds his way to
+All its instincts; he hath heard
+The Lion's roaring, and can tell
+What his horny throat expresseth,
+And to him the Tiger's yell
+Come articulate and presseth
+Or his ear like mother-tongue.
+</poem>	++++
+++++	77. Stanzas	|	<poem>
+IN a drear-nighted December,
+Too happy, happy tree,
+Thy branches ne'er remember
+Their green felicity:
+The north cannot undo them,
+With a sleety whistle through them;
+Nor frozen thawings glue them
+From budding at the prime.
+In a drear-nighted December,
+Too happy, happy brook,
+Thy bubblings ne'er remember
+Apollo's summer look;
+But with a sweet forgetting,
+They stay their crystal fretting,
+Never, never petting
+About the frozen time.
+Ah! would 'twere so with many
+A gentle girl and boy!
+But were there ever any
+Writhed not at passed joy?
+To know the change and feel it,
+When there is none to heal it,
+Nor numbed sense to steal it,
+Was never said in rhyme.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	78. Song of the Indian Maid, from 'Endymion'	|	<poem>
+wooer from the clouds,
+But hides and shrouds
+Beneath dark palm-trees by a river side?
+And as I sat, over the light blue hills
+There came a noise of revellers: the rills
+Into the wide stream came of purple hue--
+'Twas Bacchus and his crew!
+The earnest trumpet spake, and silver thrills
+From kissing cymbals made a merry din--
+'Twas Bacchus and his kin!
+Like to a moving vintage down they came,
+Crown'd with green leaves, and faces all on flame;
+All madly dancing through the pleasant valley,
+To scare thee, Melancholy!
+O then, O then, thou wast a simple name!
+And I forgot thee, as the berried holly
+By shepherds is forgotten, when in June
+Tall chestnuts keep away the sun and moon:--
+I rush'd into the folly!
+Within his car, aloft, young Bacchus stood,
+Trifling his ivy-dart, in dancing mood,
+With sidelong laughing;
+And little rills of crimson wine imbrued
+His plump white arms and shoulders, enough white
+For Venus' pearly bite;
+And near him rode Silenus on his ass,
+Pelted with flowers as he on did pass
+Tipsily quaffing.
+'Whence came ye, merry Damsels! whence came ye,
+So many, and so many, and such glee?
+Why have ye left your bowers desolate,
+Your lutes, and gentler fate?'--
+'We follow Bacchus! Bacchus on the wing,
+A-conquering!
+Bacchus, young Bacchus! good or ill betide,
+We dance before him thorough kingdoms wide:--
+Come hither, lady fair, and joined be
+To our wild minstrelsy!'
+'Whence came ye, jolly Satyrs! whence came ye,
+So many, and so many, and such glee?
+Why have ye left your forest haunts, why left
+Your nuts in oak-tree cleft?'--
+'For wine, for wine we left our kernel tree;
+For wine we left our heath, and yellow brooms,
+And cold mushrooms;
+For wine we follow Bacchus through the earth;
+Great god of breathless cups and chirping mirth!
+Come hither, lady fair, and joined be
+To our mad minstrelsy!'
+Over wide streams and mountains great we went,
+And, save when Bacchus kept his ivy tent,
+Onward the tiger and the leopard pants,
+With Asian elephants:
+Onward these myriads--with song and dance,
+With zebras striped, and sleek Arabians' prance,
+Web-footed alligators, crocodiles,
+Bearing upon their scaly backs, in files,
+Plump infant laughers mimicking the coil
+Of seamen, and stout galley-rowers' toil:
+With toying oars and silken sails they glide,
+Nor care for wind and tide.
+Mounted on panthers' furs and lions' manes,
+From rear to van they scour about the plains;
+A three days' journey in a moment done;
+And always, at the rising of the sun,
+About the wilds they hunt with spear and horn,
+On spleenful unicorn.
+I saw Osirian Egypt kneel adown
+Before the vine-wreath crown!
+I saw parch'd Abyssinia rouse and sing
+To the silver cymbals' ring!
+I saw the whelming vintage hotly pierce
+Old Tartary the fierce!
+The kings of Ind their jewel-sceptres vail,
+And from their treasures scatter pearled hail;
+Great Brahma from his mystic heaven groans,
+And all his priesthood moans,
+Before young Bacchus' eye-wink turning pale.
+Into these regions came I, following him,
+Sick-hearted, weary--so I took a whim
+To stray away into these forests drear,
+Alone, without a peer:
+And I have told thee all thou mayest hear.
+Young Stranger!
+I've been a ranger
+In search of pleasure throughout every clime;
+Alas! 'tis not for me!
+Bewitch'd I sure must be,
+To lose in grieving all my maiden prime.
+Come then, Sorrow,
+Sweetest Sorrow!
+Like an own babe I nurse thee on my breast:
+I thought to leave thee,
+And deceive thee,
+But now of all the world I love thee best.
+There is not one,
+No, no, not one
+But thee to comfort a poor lonely maid;
+Thou art her mother,
+And her brother,
+Her playmate, and her wooer in the shade.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	79. Song of the Indian Maid, from 'Endymion'	|	<poem>
+O SORROW!
+Why dost borrow
+The natural hue of health, from vermeil lips?--
+To give maiden blushes
+To the white rose bushes?
+Or is it thy dewy hand the daisy tips?
+O Sorrow!
+Why dost borrow
+The lustrous passion from a falcon-eye?--
+To give the glow-worm light?
+Or, on a moonless night,
+To tinge, on siren shores, the salt sea-spry?
+O Sorrow!
+Why dost borrow
+The mellow ditties from a mourning tongue?--
+To give at evening pale
+Unto the nightingale,
+That thou mayst listen the cold dews among?
+O Sorrow!
+Why dost borrow
+Heart's lightness from the merriment of May?--
+A lover would not tread
+A cowslip on the head,
+Though he should dance from eve till peep of day--
+Nor any drooping flower
+Held sacred for thy bower,
+Wherever he may sport himself and play.
+To Sorrow
+I bade good morrow,
+And thought to leave her far away behind;
+But cheerly, cheerly,
+She loves me dearly;
+She is so constant to me, and so kind:
+I would deceive her
+And so leave her,
+But ah! she is so constant and so kind.
+Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side,
+I sat a-weeping: in the whole world wide
+There was no one to ask me why I wept,--
+And so I kept
+Brimming the water-lily cups with tears
+Cold as my fears.
+Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side,
+I sat a-weeping: what enamour'd bride,
+Cheated by shadowy wooer from the clouds,
+But hides and shrouds
+Beneath dark palm-trees by a river side?
+And as I sat, over the light blue hills
+There came a noise of revellers: the rills
+Into the wide stream came of purple hue--
+'Twas Bacchus and his crew!
+The earnest trumpet spake, and silver thrills
+From kissing cymbals made a merry din--
+'Twas Bacchus and his kin!
+Like to a moving vintage down they came,
+Crown'd with green leaves, and faces all on flame;
+All madly dancing through the pleasant valley,
+To scare thee, Melancholy!
+O then, O then, thou wast a simple name!
+And I forgot thee, as the berried holly
+By shepherds is forgotten, when in June
+Tall chestnuts keep away the sun and moon:--
+I rush'd into the folly!
+Within his car, aloft, young Bacchus stood,
+Trifling his ivy-dart, in dancing mood,
+With sidelong laughing;
+And little rills of crimson wine imbrued
+His plump white arms and shoulders, enough white
+For Venus' pearly bite;
+And near him rode Silenus on his ass,
+Pelted with flowers as he on did pass
+Tipsily quaffing.
+'Whence came ye, merry Damsels! whence came ye,
+So many, and so many, and such glee?
+Why have ye left your bowers desolate,
+Your lutes, and gentler fate?'--
+'We follow Bacchus! Bacchus on the wing,
+A-conquering!
+Bacchus, young Bacchus! good or ill betide,
+We dance before him thorough kingdoms wide:--
+Come hither, lady fair, and joined be
+To our wild minstrelsy!'
+'Whence came ye, jolly Satyrs! whence came ye,
+So many, and so many, and such glee?
+Why have ye left your forest haunts, why left
+Your nuts in oak-tree cleft?'--
+'For wine, for wine we left our kernel tree;
+For wine we left our heath, and yellow brooms,
+And cold mushrooms;
+For wine we follow Bacchus through the earth;
+Great god of breathless cups and chirping mirth!
+Come hither, lady fair, and joined be
+To our mad minstrelsy!'
+Over wide streams and mountains great we went,
+And, save when Bacchus kept his ivy tent,
+Onward the tiger and the leopard pants,
+With Asian elephants:
+Onward these myriads--with song and dance,
+With zebras striped, and sleek Arabians' prance,
+Web-footed alligators, crocodiles,
+Bearing upon their scaly backs, in files,
+Plump infant laughers mimicking the coil
+Of seamen, and stout galley-rowers' toil:
+With toying oars and silken sails they glide,
+Nor care for wind and tide.
+Mounted on panthers' furs and lions' manes,
+From rear to van they scour about the plains;
+A three days' journey in a moment done;
+And always, at the rising of the sun,
+About the wilds they hunt with spear and horn,
+On spleenful unicorn.
+I saw Osirian Egypt kneel adown
+Before the vine-wreath crown!
+I saw parch'd Abyssinia rouse and sing
+To the silver cymbals' ring!
+I saw the whelming vintage hotly pierce
+Old Tartary the fierce!
+The kings of Ind their jewel-sceptres vail,
+And from their treasures scatter pearled hail;
+Great Brahma from his mystic heaven groans,
+And all his priesthood moans,
+Before young Bacchus' eye-wink turning pale.
+Into these regions came I, following him,
+Sick-hearted, weary--so I took a whim
+To stray away into these forests drear,
+Alone, without a peer:
+And I have told thee all thou mayest hear.
+Young Stranger!
+I've been a ranger
+In search of pleasure throughout every clime;
+Alas! 'tis not for me!
+Bewitch'd I sure must be,
+To lose in grieving all my maiden prime.
+Come then, Sorrow,
+Sweetest Sorrow!
+Like an own babe I nurse thee on my breast:
+I thought to leave thee,
+And deceive thee,
+But now of all the world I love thee best.
+There is not one,
+No, no, not one
+But thee to comfort a poor lonely maid;
+Thou art her mother,
+And her brother,
+Her playmate, and her wooer in the shade.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	80. Keen, Fitful Gusts are Whisp'ring Here and There	|	<poem>
+Keen, fitful gusts are whisp'ring here and there
+Among the bushes half leafless, and dry;
+The stars look very cold about the sky,
+And I have many miles on foot to fare.
+Yet feel I little of the cool bleak air,
+Or of the dead leaves rustling drearily,
+Or of those silver lamps that burn on high,
+Or of the distance from home's pleasant lair:
+For I am brimfull of the friendliness
+That in a little cottage I have found;
+Of fair-hair'd Milton's eloquent distress,
+And all his love for gentle Lycid drown'd;
+Of lovely Laura in her light green dress,
+And faithful Petrarch gloriously crown'd.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	81. To Mrs Reynolds' Cat	|Cat! who hast pass’d thy grand climacteric,
+	<poem>
+How many mice and rats hast in thy days
+Destroy’d? How many tit bits stolen? Gaze
+With those bright languid segments green, and prick
+Those velvet ears - but pr’ythee do not stick
+Thy latent talons in me - and upraise
+Thy gentle mew - and tell me all thy frays,
+Of fish and mice, and rats and tender chick.
+Nay, look not down, nor lick thy dainty wrists -
+For all thy wheezy asthma - and for all
+Thy tail’s tip is nick’d off - and though the fists
+Of many a maid have given thee many a maul,
+Still is that fur as soft, as when the lists
+In youth thou enter’dest on glass bottled wall.	</poem>	++++
+++++	82. Fragment of an Ode to Maia	|	<poem>
+MOTHER of Hermes! and still youthful Maia!
+May I sing to thee
+As thou wast hymned on the shores of Baiae?
+Or may I woo thee
+In earlier Sicilian? or thy smiles
+Seek as they once were sought, in Grecian isles,
+By bards who died content on pleasant sward,
+Leaving great verse unto a little clan?
+O give me their old vigour! and unheard
+Save of the quiet primrose, and the span
+Of heaven, and few ears,
+Rounded by thee, my song should die away
+Content as theirs,
+Rich in the simple worship of a day.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	83. Lines from Endymion	|	<poem>
+A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
+Its loviliness increases; it will never
+Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
+A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
+Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
+Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
+A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
+Spite of despondance, of the inhuman dearth
+Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
+Of all the unhealthy and o`er-darkened ways
+Made for our searching: yes, inspite of all,
+Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
+From our dark spirits.
+	</poem>	++++
+++++	84. Bards of Passion and of Mirth, written on the Blank Page before Beaumont and Fletcher's Tragi-Comedy 'The Fair Maid of the Inn'	|	<poem>
+BARDS of Passion and of Mirth,
+Ye have left your souls on earth!
+Have ye souls in heaven too,
+Doubled-lived in regions new?
+Yes, and those of heaven commune
+With the spheres of sun and moon;
+With the noise of fountains wondrous,
+And the parle of voices thund'rous;
+With the whisper of heaven's trees
+And one another, in soft ease
+Seated on Elysian lawns
+Browsed by none but Dian's fawns;
+Underneath large blue-bells tented,
+Where the daisies are rose-scented,
+And the rose herself has got
+Perfume which on earth is not;
+Where the nightingale doth sing
+Not a senseless, tranced thing,
+But divine melodious truth;
+Philosophic numbers smooth;
+Tales and golden histories
+Of heaven and its mysteries.
+Thus ye live on high, and then
+On the earth ye live again;
+And the souls ye left behind you
+Teach us, here, the way to find you,
+Where your other souls are joying,
+Never slumber'd, never cloying.
+Here, your earth-born souls still speak
+To mortals, of their little week;
+Of their sorrows and delights;
+Of their passions and their spites;
+Of their glory and their shame;
+What doth strengthen and what maim.
+Thus ye teach us, every day,
+Wisdom, though fled far away.
+Bards of Passion and of Mirth,
+Ye have left your souls on earth!
+Ye have souls in heaven too,
+Double-lived in regions new!
+	</poem>	++++

nme.kr

문서 도구

사이트 도구

사용자 도구

왼쪽 메뉴 편집

Plugin 관리
테마 디자인

차이

nme.kr

문서 도구

사이트 도구

사용자 도구

왼쪽 메뉴 편집 Plugin 관리 테마 디자인

차이

왼쪽 메뉴 편집

Plugin 관리
테마 디자인