| |
| 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; | 5 |
| 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:— | 10 |
| 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 | 15 |
| 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 | 20 |
| 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. | 25 |
| 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 | 30 |
| 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: | 35 |
| 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 | 40 |
| 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 | 45 |
| 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 | 50 |
| 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? | 55 |
| 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 | 60 |
| 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 | 65 |
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! | 70 |
| 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!— | 75 |
| 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 | 80 |
| 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 | 85 |
| 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 | 90 |
| 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— | 95 |
| 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. | 100 |
| 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 | 105 |
| 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 | 110 |
| 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: | 115 |
| 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 | 120 |
| 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: | 125 |
| “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 | 130 |
| 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 | 135 |
| 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 | 140 |
| 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——— | 145 |
| “O Sorrow, | |
| Why dost borrow | |
| The natural hue of health, from vermeil lips?— | |
| To give maiden blushes | |
| To the white rose bushes? | 150 |
| 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? | 155 |
| 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?— | 160 |
| To give at evening pale | |
| Unto the nightingale, | |
| That thou mayst listen the cold dews among? | |
| |
| “O Sorrow, | |
| Why dost borrow | 165 |
| 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 | 170 |
| 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; | 175 |
| But cheerly, cheerly, | |
| She loves me dearly; | |
| She is so constant to me, and so kind: | |
| I would deceive her | |
| And so leave her, | 180 |
| 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 | 185 |
| 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, | 190 |
| 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— | 195 |
| ’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, | 200 |
| 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 | 205 |
| 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, | 210 |
| 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, | 215 |
| 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, | 220 |
| 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:— | 225 |
| 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 | 230 |
| 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; | 235 |
| 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, | 240 |
| 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, | 245 |
| 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. | 250 |
| |
| “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, | 255 |
| 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! | 260 |
| 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, | 265 |
| 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 | 270 |
| 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: | 275 |
| Alas! ’tis not for me! | |
| Bewitch’d I sure must be, | |
| To lose in grieving all my maiden prime. | |
| |
| “Come then, Sorrow! | |
| Sweetest Sorrow! | 280 |
| 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, | 285 |
| 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.” | 290 |
| |
| 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, | 295 |
| 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; | 300 |
| 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? | 305 |
| 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!— | 310 |
| 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; | 315 |
| 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! | 320 |
| 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, | 325 |
| 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, | 330 |
| 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 | 335 |
| 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; | 340 |
| 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 | 345 |
| 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, | 350 |
| 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 | 355 |
| 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 | 360 |
| 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, | 365 |
| 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. | 370 |
| 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 | 375 |
| 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. | 380 |
| 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, | 385 |
| 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 | 390 |
| 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, | 395 |
| 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; | 400 |
| 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 | 405 |
| 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: | 410 |
| 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 | 415 |
| 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 | 420 |
| 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 | 425 |
| 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, | 430 |
| 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, | 435 |
| 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 | 440 |
| 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, | 445 |
| 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 | 450 |
| 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. | 455 |
| 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, | 460 |
| 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 | 465 |
| 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 | 470 |
| 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 | 475 |
| 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: | 480 |
| 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 | 485 |
| 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 | 490 |
| 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. | 495 |
| |
| 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 | 500 |
| 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 | 505 |
| 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. | 510 |
| 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. | 515 |
| 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 | 520 |
| 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. | 525 |
| 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 | 530 |
| 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— | 535 |
| 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; | 540 |
| 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! | 545 |
| 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 | 550 |
| 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 | 555 |
| 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 | 560 |
| 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 | 565 |
| 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! | 570 |
| 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, | 575 |
| 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!— | 580 |
| 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: | 585 |
| 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!— | 590 |
| 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! | 595 |
| 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, | 600 |
| 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. | 605 |
| 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.— | 610 |
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 | 615 |
| 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, | 620 |
| 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; | 625 |
| 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, | 630 |
| 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 | 635 |
| 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 | 640 |
| 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. | 645 |
| 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 | 650 |
| 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. | 655 |
| 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 | 660 |
| 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, | 665 |
| 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 | 670 |
| 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; | 675 |
| 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 | 680 |
| 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: | 685 |
| 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,— | 690 |
| 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, | 695 |
| 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. | 700 |
| 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; | 705 |
| 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! | 710 |
| 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, | 715 |
| 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? | 720 |
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; | 725 |
| 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 | 730 |
| 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. | 735 |
| 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: | 740 |
| 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, | 745 |
| 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, | 750 |
| 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 | 755 |
| 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 | 760 |
| 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. | 765 |
| 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 | 770 |
| 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? | 775 |
| 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 | 780 |
| 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 | 785 |
| 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, | 790 |
| 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, | 795 |
| 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! | 800 |
| 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 | 805 |
| 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. | 810 |
| 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; | 815 |
| 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; | 820 |
| 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, | 825 |
| 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, | 830 |
| 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. | 835 |
| 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. | 840 |
| 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 | 845 |
| 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, | 850 |
| 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 | 855 |
| 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, | 860 |
| 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 | 865 |
| 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! | 870 |
| 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, | 875 |
| 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! | 880 |
| 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 | 885 |
| 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: | 890 |
| 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 | 895 |
| 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 | 900 |
| 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 | 905 |
| 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. | 910 |
| 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— | 915 |
| 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 | 920 |
| 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, | 925 |
| 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. | 930 |
| 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 | 935 |
| 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 | 940 |
| 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; | 945 |
| 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 | 950 |
| 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, | 955 |
| 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 | 960 |
| 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 | 965 |
| 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 | 970 |
| 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, | 975 |
| 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 | 980 |
| 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 | 985 |
| 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; | 990 |
| 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 | 995 |
| 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, | 1000 |
| Before three swiftest kisses he had told, | |
| They vanish’d far away!—Peona went | |
Home through the gloomy wood in wonderment.
THE END. | |
| |
| See Notes. |
| |
