Selected Poems and Prose

  205Stained that within which still disdains to wear it.—

  ‘If I have been extinguished, yet there rise

  A thousand beacons from the spark I bore.’—

  ‘And who are those chained to the car?’ ‘The Wise,

  ‘The great, the unforgotten, they who wore

  210 Mitres and helms and crowns, or wreathes of light,

  Signs of thought’s empire over thought; their lore

  ‘Taught them not this—to know themselves; their might

  Could not repress the mutiny within,

  And for the morn of truth they feigned, deep night

  215‘Caught them ere evening.’ ‘Who is he with chin

  Upon his breast and hands crost on his chain?’

  ‘The Child of a fierce hour; He sought to win

  ‘The world, and lost all it did contain

  Of greatness, in its hope destroyed; and more

  220 Of fame and peace than Virtue’s self can gain

  ‘Without the opportunity which bore

  Him on its eagle’s pinion to the peak

  From which a thousand climbers have before

  ‘Fall’n as Napoleon fell.’—I felt my cheek

  225Alter to see the great form pass away

  Whose grasp had left the giant world so weak

  That every pigmy kicked it as it lay—

  And much I grieved to think how power and will

  In opposition rule our mortal day—

  230 And why God made irreconcilable

  Good and the means of good; and for despair

  I half disdained mine eye’s desire to fill

  With the spent vision of the times that were

  And scarce have ceased to be … ‘Dost thou behold,’

  235Said then my guide, ‘those spoilers spoiled, Voltaire,

  ‘Frederic and Kant, Catharine, and Leopold,

  Chained hoary anarch, demagogue and sage

  Whose name the fresh world thinks already old—

  ‘For in the battle Life and they did wage

  240 She remained conqueror—I was overcome

  By my own heart alone; which neither age

  ‘Nor tears nor infamy nor now the tomb

  Could temper to its object.’ ‘Let them pass’—

  I cried—‘the world and its mysterious doom

  245‘Is not so much more glorious than it was

  That I desire to worship those who drew

  New figures on its false and fragile glass

  ‘As the old faded.’—‘Figures ever new

  Rise on the bubble, paint them how you may;

  250 We have but thrown, as those before us threw,

  ‘Our shadows on it as it past away.

  But mark how chained to the triumphal chair

  The mighty phantoms of an elder day—

  ‘All that is mortal of great Plato there

  255Expiates the joy and woe his master knew not;

  That star that ruled his doom was far too fair—

  ‘And Life, where long that flower of Heaven grew not,

  Conquered the heart by love which gold or pain

  Or age or sloth or slavery could subdue not.—

  260 ‘And near walk the [    ] twain,

  The tutor and his pupil, whom Dominion

  Followed as tame as vulture in a chain.—

  ‘The world was darkened beneath either pinion

  Of him whom from the flock of conquerors

  265Fame singled as her thunder-bearing minion;

  ‘The other long outlived both woes and wars

  Throned in new thoughts of men, and still had kept

  The jealous keys of truth’s eternal doors

  ‘If Bacon’s spirit [  ] had not leapt

  270 Like lightning out of darkness; he compelled

  The Proteus shape of Nature’s as it slept

  ‘To wake and to unbar the caves that held

  The treasure of the secrets of its reign.—

  See the great bards of old who inly quelled

  275‘The passions which they sung, as by their strain

  May well be known: their living melody

  Tempers its own contagion to the vein

  ‘Of those who are infected with it—I

  Have suffered what I wrote, or viler pain!—

  280 ‘And so my words were seeds of misery—

  Even as the deeds of others.’—‘Not as theirs,’

  I said—he pointed to a company

  In which I recognized amid the heirs

  Of Caesar’s crime, from him to Constantine

  285The Anarchs old whose force and murderous snares

  Had founded many a sceptre-bearing line

  And spread the plague of blood and gold abroad,

  And Gregory and John and men divine

  Who rose like shadows between Man and god

  290 Till that eclipse, still hanging under Heaven,

  Was worshipped by the world o’er which they strode

  For the true Sun it quenched.—‘Their power was given

  But to destroy,’ replied the leader—‘I

  Am one of those who have created, even

  295‘If it be but a world of agony.’—

  ‘Whence camest thou and whither goest thou?

  How did thy course begin,’ I said, ‘and why?

  ‘Mine eyes are sick of this perpetual flow

  Of people, and my heart of one sad thought.—

  300 Speak.’— ‘Whence I came, partly I seem to know,

  ‘And how and by what paths I have been brought

  To this dread pass, methinks even thou mayst guess;

  Why this should be my mind can compass not—

  ‘Whither the conqueror hurries me still less.

  305But follow thou, and from spectator turn

  Actor or victim in this wretchedness

  ‘And what thou wouldst be taught I then may learn

  From thee.—Now listen … In the April prime

  When all the forest tops began to burn

  310 ‘With kindling green, touched by the azure clime

  Of the young year, I found myself asleep

  Under a mountain which from unknown time

  ‘Had yawned into a cavern high and deep,

  And from it came a gentle rivulet

  315Whose water like clear air in its calm sweep

  ‘Bent the soft grass and kept for ever wet

  The stems of the sweet flowers, and filled the grove

  With sound which all who hear must needs forget

  ‘All pleasure and all pain, all hate and love,

  320 Which they had known before that hour of rest:

  A sleeping mother then would dream not of

  ‘The only child who died upon her breast

  At eventide, a king would mourn no more

  The crown of which his brow was dispossest

  325‘When the sun lingered o’er the Ocean floor

  To gild his rival’s new prosperity.—

  Thou wouldst forget thus vainly to deplore

  ‘Ills, which if ills, can find no cure from thee,

  The thought of which no other sleep will quell

  330 Nor other music blot from memory—

  ‘So sweet and deep is the oblivious spell.—

  Whether my life had been before that sleep

  The Heaven which I imagine, or a Hell

  ‘Like this harsh world in which I wake to weep,

  335I know not. I arose and for a space

  The scene of woods and waters seemed to keep,

  ‘Though it was now broad day, a gentle trace

  Of light diviner than the common Sun

  Sheds on the common Earth, but all the place

  340 ‘Was filled with many sounds woven into one

  Oblivious melody, confusing sense

  Amid the gliding waves and shadows dun;

  ‘And as I looked the bright omnipresence


  Of morning through the orient cavern flowed,

  345And the Sun’s image radiantly intense

  ‘Burned on the waters of the well that glowed

  Like gold, and threaded all the forest maze

  With winding paths of emerald fire—there stood

  ‘Amid the sun, as he amid the blaze

  350 Of his own glory, on the vibrating

  Floor of the fountain, paved with flashing rays,

  ‘A shape all light, which with one hand did fling

  Dew on the earth, as if she were the Dawn

  Whose invisible rain forever seemed to sing

  355‘A silver music on the mossy lawn,

  And still before her on the dusky grass

  Iris her many-coloured scarf had drawn.—

  ‘In her right hand she bore a chrystal glass

  Mantling with bright Nepenthe;—the fierce splendour

  360 Fell from her as she moved under the mass

  ‘Of the deep cavern, and with palms so tender

  Their tread broke not the mirror of its billow,

  Glided along the river, and did bend her

  ‘Head under the dark boughs, till like a willow

  365Her fair hair swept the bosom of the stream

  That whispered with delight to be their pillow.—

  ‘As one enamoured is upborne in dream

  O’er lily-paven lakes mid silver mist

  To wondrous music, so this shape might seem

  370 ‘Partly to tread the waves with feet which kist

  The dancing foam, partly to glide along

  The airs that roughened the moist amethyst,

  ‘Or the slant morning beams that fell among

  The trees, or the soft shadows of the trees;

  375And her feet ever to the ceaseless song

  ‘Of leaves and winds and waves and birds and bees

  And falling drops moved in a measure new

  Yet sweet, as on the summer evening breeze

  ‘Up from the lake a shape of golden dew

  380 Between two rocks, athwart the rising moon,

  Dances i’ the wind where eagle never flew.—

  ‘And still her feet, no less than the sweet tune

  To which they moved, seemed as they moved, to blot

  The thoughts of him who gazed on them, and soon

  385‘All that was seemed as if it had been not—

  As if the gazer’s mind was strewn beneath

  Her feet like embers, and she, thought by thought,

  ‘Trampled its fires into the dust of death,

  As Day upon the threshold of the east

  390 Treads out the lamps of night, until the breath

  ‘Of darkness reillumine even the least

  Of Heaven’s living eyes—like day she came,

  Making the night a dream; and ere she ceased

  ‘To move, as one between desire and shame

  395Suspended, I said—“If, as it doth seem,

  Thou comest from the realm without a name,

  ‘“Into this valley of perpetual dream,

  Shew whence I came, and where I am, and why—

  Pass not away upon the passing stream.”

  400 ‘“Arise and quench thy thirst”, was her reply.

  And as a shut lily, stricken by the wand

  Of dewy morning’s vital alchemy,

  ‘I rose; and, bending at her sweet command,

  Touched with faint lips the cup she raised,

  405And suddenly my brain became as sand

  ‘Where the first wave had more than half erased

  The track of deer on desert Labrador,

  Whilst the empty wolf from which they fled amazed

  ‘Leaves his stamp visibly upon the shore

  410 Until the second bursts—so on my sight

  Burst a new Vision never seen before.—

  ‘And the fair shape waned in the coming light

  As veil by veil the silent splendour drops

  From Lucifer, amid the chrysolite

  415‘Of sunrise ere it strike the mountain tops—

  And as the presence of that fairest planet,

  Although unseen, is felt by one who hopes

  ‘That his day’s path may end as he began it

  In that star’s smile, whose light is like the scent

  420 Of a jonquil when evening breezes fan it,

  ‘Or the soft note in which his dear lament

  The Brescian shepherd breathes, or the caress

  That turned his weary slumber to content—

  ‘So knew I in that light’s severe excess

  425The presence of that shape which on the stream

  Moved, as I moved along the wilderness,

  ‘More dimly than a day-appearing dream,

  The ghost of a forgotten form of sleep,

  A light from Heaven whose half-extinguished beam

  430 ‘Through the sick day in which we wake to weep

  Glimmers, forever sought, forever lost.—

  So did that shape its obscure tenour keep

  ‘Beside my path as silent as a ghost;

  But the new Vision, and its cold bright car,

  435With savage music, stunning music, crost

  ‘The forest, and as if from some dread war

  Triumphantly returning, the loud million

  Fiercely extolled the fortune of her star.—

  ‘A moving arch of victory, the vermilion

  440 And green and azure plumes of Iris had

  Built high over her wind-winged pavilion,

  ‘And underneath aetherial glory clad

  The wilderness, and far before her flew

  The tempest of the splendour which forbade

  445‘Shadow to fall from leaf or stone;—the crew

  Seemed in that light like atomies that dance

  Within a sunbeam;—some upon the new

  ‘Embroidery of flowers that did enhance

  The grassy vesture of the desert, played,

  450 Forgetful of the chariot’s swift advance;

  ‘Others stood gazing till within the shade

  Of the great mountain its light left them dim.—

  Others outspeeded it, and others made

  ‘Circles around it like the clouds that swim

  455Round the high moon in a bright sea of air,

  And more did follow, with exulting hymn,

  ‘The chariot and the captives fettered there,

  But all like bubbles on an eddying flood

  Fell into the same track at last and were

  460 ‘Borne onward.—I among the multitude

  Was swept; me sweetest flowers delayed not long,

  Me not the shadow nor the solitude,

  ‘Me not the falling stream’s Lethean song,

  Me, not the phantom of that early form

  465Which moved upon its motion,—but among

  ‘The thickest billows of the living storm

  I plunged, and bared my bosom to the clime

  Of that cold light, whose airs too soon deform.—

  ‘Before the chariot had begun to climb

  470 The opposing steep of that mysterious dell,

  Behold a wonder worthy of the rhyme

  ‘Of him who from the lowest depths of Hell

  Through every Paradise and through all glory

  Love led serene, and who returned to tell

  475‘In words of hate and awe the wondrous story

  How all things are transfigured, except Love;

  For deaf as is a sea which wrath makes hoary

  ‘The world can hear not the sweet notes that move

  The sphere whose light is melody to lovers—

  480 A wonder worthy of his rhyme—the grove

  ‘Grew dense with shadows to its inmost covers,

  The earth was grey with phantoms, and the air

  Was peopled with dim forms, as when there hovers

  ‘A flock of vampire-bats before the
glare

  485Of the tropic sun, bringing ere evening

  Strange night upon some Indian isle,—thus were

  ‘Phantoms diffused around, and some did fling

  Shadows of shadows, yet unlike themselves,

  Behind them, some like eaglets on the wing

  490 ‘Were lost in the white blaze, others like elves

  Danced in a thousand unimagined shapes

  Upon the sunny streams and grassy shelves;

  ‘And others sate chattering like restless apes

  On vulgar hands, and over shoulders leapt.

  495Some made a cradle of the ermined capes

  ‘Of kingly mantles, some upon the tiar

  Of pontiffs sate like vultures, others played

  Within the crown which girt with empire

  ‘A baby’s or an idiot’s brow, and made

  500 Their nests in it; the old anatomies

  Sate hatching their base brood under the shade

  ‘Of demon wings, and laughed from their dead eyes

  To reassume the delegated power

  Arrayed in which these worms did monarchize

  505‘Who make this earth their charnel.—Others more

  Humble, like falcons sate upon the fist

  Of common men, and round their heads did soar,

  ‘Or like small gnats and flies as thick as mist

  On evening marshes, thronged about the brow