The
gleanings
of precarious charity
Her scantiness of food did scarce supply.
Her scantiness of food did scarce supply.
Shelley copy
. . .
CHORUS OF SPIRITS:
Stay, ye days of contentment and joy,
Whilst love every care is erasing, _75
Stay ye pleasures that never can cloy,
And ye spirits that can never cease pleasing.
And if any soft passion be near,
Which mortals, frail mortals, can know,
Let love shed on the bosom a tear, _80
And dissolve the chill ice-drop of woe.
SYMPHONY.
FRANCIS:
'Soft, my dearest angel, stay,
Oh! you suck my soul away;
Suck on, suck on, I glow, I glow!
Tides of maddening passion roll, _85
And streams of rapture drown my soul.
Now give me one more billing kiss,
Let your lips now repeat the bliss,
Endless kisses steal my breath,
No life can equal such a death. ' _90
CHARLOTTE:
'Oh! yes I will kiss thine eyes so fair,
And I will clasp thy form;
Serene is the breath of the balmy air,
But I think, love, thou feelest me warm
And I will recline on thy marble neck _95
Till I mingle into thee;
And I will kiss the rose on thy cheek,
And thou shalt give kisses to me.
For here is no morn to flout our delight,
Oh! dost thou not joy at this? _100
And here we may lie an endless night,
A long, long night of bliss. '
Spirits! when raptures move,
Say what it is to love,
When passion's tear stands on the cheek, _105
When bursts the unconscious sigh;
And the tremulous lips dare not speak
What is told by the soul-felt eye.
But what is sweeter to revenge's ear
Than the fell tyrant's last expiring yell? _110
Yes! than love's sweetest blisses 'tis more dear
To drink the floatings of a despot's knell.
I wake--'tis done--'tis over.
NOTE:
_66 ye]thou 1810.
***
DESPAIR.
And canst thou mock mine agony, thus calm
In cloudless radiance, Queen of silver night?
Can you, ye flow'rets, spread your perfumed balm
Mid pearly gems of dew that shine so bright?
And you wild winds, thus can you sleep so still _5
Whilst throbs the tempest of my breast so high?
Can the fierce night-fiends rest on yonder hill,
And, in the eternal mansions of the sky,
Can the directors of the storm in powerless silence lie?
Hark! I hear music on the zephyr's wing, _10
Louder it floats along the unruffled sky;
Some fairy sure has touched the viewless string--
Now faint in distant air the murmurs die.
Awhile it stills the tide of agony.
Now--now it loftier swells--again stern woe _15
Arises with the awakening melody.
Again fierce torments, such as demons know,
In bitterer, feller tide, on this torn bosom flow.
Arise ye sightless spirits of the storm,
Ye unseen minstrels of the aereal song, _20
Pour the fierce tide around this lonely form,
And roll the tempest's wildest swell along.
Dart the red lightning, wing the forked flash,
Pour from thy cloud-formed hills the thunder's roar;
Arouse the whirlwind--and let ocean dash _25
In fiercest tumult on the rocking shore,--
Destroy this life or let earth's fabric be no more.
Yes! every tie that links me here is dead;
Mysterious Fate, thy mandate I obey,
Since hope and peace, and joy, for aye are fled, _30
I come, terrific power, I come away.
Then o'er this ruined soul let spirits of Hell,
In triumph, laughing wildly, mock its pain;
And though with direst pangs mine heart-strings swell,
I'll echo back their deadly yells again, _35
Cursing the power that ne'er made aught in vain.
***
FRAGMENT.
Yes! all is past--swift time has fled away,
Yet its swell pauses on my sickening mind;
How long will horror nerve this frame of clay?
I'm dead, and lingers yet my soul behind.
Oh! powerful Fate, revoke thy deadly spell, _5
And yet that may not ever, ever be,
Heaven will not smile upon the work of Hell;
Ah! no, for Heaven cannot smile on me;
Fate, envious Fate, has sealed my wayward destiny.
I sought the cold brink of the midnight surge, _10
I sighed beneath its wave to hide my woes,
The rising tempest sung a funeral dirge,
And on the blast a frightful yell arose.
Wild flew the meteors o'er the maddened main,
Wilder did grief athwart my bosom glare; _15
Stilled was the unearthly howling, and a strain,
Swelled mid the tumult of the battling air,
'Twas like a spirit's song, but yet more soft and fair.
I met a maniac--like he was to me,
I said--'Poor victim, wherefore dost thou roam? _20
And canst thou not contend with agony,
That thus at midnight thou dost quit thine home? '
'Ah there she sleeps: cold is her bloodless form,
And I will go to slumber in her grave;
And then our ghosts, whilst raves the maddened storm, _25
Will sweep at midnight o'er the wildered wave;
Wilt thou our lowly beds with tears of pity lave? '
'Ah! no, I cannot shed the pitying tear,
This breast is cold, this heart can feel no more--
But I can rest me on thy chilling bier, _30
Can shriek in horror to the tempest's roar. '
***
THE SPECTRAL HORSEMAN.
What was the shriek that struck Fancy's ear
As it sate on the ruins of time that is past?
Hark! it floats on the fitful blast of the wind,
And breathes to the pale moon a funeral sigh.
It is the Benshie's moan on the storm, _5
Or a shivering fiend that thirsting for sin,
Seeks murder and guilt when virtue sleeps,
Winged with the power of some ruthless king,
And sweeps o'er the breast of the prostrate plain.
It was not a fiend from the regions of Hell _10
That poured its low moan on the stillness of night:
It was not a ghost of the guilty dead,
Nor a yelling vampire reeking with gore;
But aye at the close of seven years' end,
That voice is mixed with the swell of the storm, _15
And aye at the close of seven years' end,
A shapeless shadow that sleeps on the hill
Awakens and floats on the mist of the heath.
It is not the shade of a murdered man,
Who has rushed uncalled to the throne of his God, _20
And howls in the pause of the eddying storm.
This voice is low, cold, hollow, and chill,
'Tis not heard by the ear, but is felt in the soul.
'Tis more frightful far than the death-daemon's scream,
Or the laughter of fiends when they howl o'er the corpse _25
Of a man who has sold his soul to Hell.
It tells the approach of a mystic form,
A white courser bears the shadowy sprite;
More thin they are than the mists of the mountain,
When the clear moonlight sleeps on the waveless lake. _30
More pale HIS cheek than the snows of Nithona,
When winter rides on the northern blast,
And howls in the midst of the leafless wood.
Yet when the fierce swell of the tempest is raving,
And the whirlwinds howl in the caves of Inisfallen, _35
Still secure mid the wildest war of the sky,
The phantom courser scours the waste,
And his rider howls in the thunder's roar.
O'er him the fierce bolts of avenging Heaven
Pause, as in fear, to strike his head. _40
The meteors of midnight recoil from his figure,
Yet the 'wildered peasant, that oft passes by,
With wonder beholds the blue flash through his form:
And his voice, though faint as the sighs of the dead,
The startled passenger shudders to hear, _45
More distinct than the thunder's wildest roar.
Then does the dragon, who, chained in the caverns
To eternity, curses the champion of Erin,
Moan and yell loud at the lone hour of midnight,
And twine his vast wreaths round the forms of the daemons; _50
Then in agony roll his death-swimming eyeballs,
Though 'wildered by death, yet never to die!
Then he shakes from his skeleton folds the nightmares,
Who, shrieking in agony, seek the couch
Of some fevered wretch who courts sleep in vain; _55
Then the tombless ghosts of the guilty dead
In horror pause on the fitful gale.
They float on the swell of the eddying tempest,
And scared seek the caves of gigantic. . .
Where their thin forms pour unearthly sounds _60
On the blast that sweets the breast of the lake,
And mingles its swell with the moonlight air.
***
MELODY TO A SCENE OF FORMER TIMES.
Art thou indeed forever gone,
Forever, ever, lost to me?
Must this poor bosom beat alone,
Or beat at all, if not for thee?
Ah! why was love to mortals given, _5
To lift them to the height of Heaven,
Or dash them to the depths of Hell?
Yet I do not reproach thee, dear!
Ah, no! the agonies that swell
This panting breast, this frenzied brain, _10
Might wake my --'s slumb'ring tear.
Oh! Heaven is witness I did love,
And Heaven does know I love thee still,
Does know the fruitless sick'ning thrill,
When reason's judgement vainly strove _15
To blot thee from my memory;
But which might never, never be.
Oh! I appeal to that blest day
When passion's wildest ecstasy
Was coldness to the joys I knew, _20
When every sorrow sunk away.
Oh! I had never lived before,
But now those blisses are no more.
And now I cease to live again,
I do not blame thee, love; ah, no! _25
The breast that feels this anguished woe.
Throbs for thy happiness alone.
Two years of speechless bliss are gone,
I thank thee, dearest, for the dream.
'Tis night--what faint and distant scream _30
Comes on the wild and fitful blast?
It moans for pleasures that are past,
It moans for days that are gone by.
Oh! lagging hours, how slow you fly!
I see a dark and lengthened vale, _35
The black view closes with the tomb;
But darker is the lowering gloom
That shades the intervening dale.
In visioned slumber for awhile
I seem again to share thy smile, _40
I seem to hang upon thy tone.
Again you say, 'Confide in me,
For I am thine, and thine alone,
And thine must ever, ever be. '
But oh! awak'ning still anew, _45
Athwart my enanguished senses flew
A fiercer, deadlier agony!
[End of "Posthumous Fragments of Margaret Nicholson". ]
***
STANZA FROM A TRANSLATION OF THE MARSEILLAISE HYMN.
[Published by Forman, "Poetical Works of P. B. S. ", 1876; dated 1810. ]
Tremble, Kings despised of man!
Ye traitors to your Country,
Tremble! Your parricidal plan
At length shall meet its destiny. . .
We all are soldiers fit to fight, _5
But if we sink in glory's night
Our mother Earth will give ye new
The brilliant pathway to pursue
Which leads to Death or Victory. . .
***
BIGOTRY'S VICTIM.
[Published (without title) by Hogg, "Life of Shelley", 1858; dated
1809-10. The title is Rossetti's (1870). ]
1.
Dares the lama, most fleet of the sons of the wind,
The lion to rouse from his skull-covered lair?
When the tiger approaches can the fast-fleeting hind
Repose trust in his footsteps of air?
No! Abandoned he sinks in a trance of despair, _5
The monster transfixes his prey,
On the sand flows his life-blood away;
Whilst India's rocks to his death-yells reply,
Protracting the horrible harmony.
2.
Yet the fowl of the desert, when danger encroaches, _10
Dares fearless to perish defending her brood,
Though the fiercest of cloud-piercing tyrants approaches
Thirsting--ay, thirsting for blood;
And demands, like mankind, his brother for food;
Yet more lenient, more gentle than they; _15
For hunger, not glory, the prey
Must perish. Revenge does not howl in the dead.
Nor ambition with fame crown the murderer's head.
3.
Though weak as the lama that bounds on the mountains,
And endued not with fast-fleeting footsteps of air, _20
Yet, yet will I draw from the purest of fountains,
Though a fiercer than tiger is there.
Though, more dreadful than death, it scatters despair,
Though its shadow eclipses the day,
And the darkness of deepest dismay _25
Spreads the influence of soul-chilling terror around,
And lowers on the corpses, that rot on the ground.
4.
They came to the fountain to draw from its stream
Waves too pure, too celestial, for mortals to see;
They bathed for awhile in its silvery beam, _30
Then perished, and perished like me.
For in vain from the grasp of the Bigot I flee;
The most tenderly loved of my soul
Are slaves to his hated control.
He pursues me, he blasts me! 'Tis in vain that I fly: _35 -
What remains, but to curse him,--to curse him and die?
***
ON AN ICICLE THAT CLUNG TO THE GRASS OF A GRAVE.
[Published (without title) by Hogg, "Life of Shelley", 1858; dated
1809-10. The poem, with title as above, is included in the Esdaile
manuscript book. ]
1.
Oh! take the pure gem to where southerly breezes,
Waft repose to some bosom as faithful as fair,
In which the warm current of love never freezes,
As it rises unmingled with selfishness there,
Which, untainted by pride, unpolluted by care, _5
Might dissolve the dim icedrop, might bid it arise,
Too pure for these regions, to gleam in the skies.
2.
Or where the stern warrior, his country defending,
Dares fearless the dark-rolling battle to pour,
Or o'er the fell corpse of a dread tyrant bending, _10
Where patriotism red with his guilt-reeking gore
Plants Liberty's flag on the slave-peopled shore,
With victory's cry, with the shout of the free,
Let it fly, taintless Spirit, to mingle with thee.
3.
For I found the pure gem, when the daybeam returning, _15
Ineffectual gleams on the snow-covered plain,
When to others the wished-for arrival of morning
Brings relief to long visions of soul-racking pain;
But regret is an insult--to grieve is in vain:
And why should we grieve that a spirit so fair _20
Seeks Heaven to mix with its own kindred there?
4.
But still 'twas some Spirit of kindness descending
To share in the load of mortality's woe,
Who over thy lowly-built sepulchre bending
Bade sympathy's tenderest teardrop to flow. _25
Not for THEE soft compassion celestials did know,
But if ANGELS can weep, sure MAN may repine,
May weep in mute grief o'er thy low-laid shrine.
5.
And did I then say, for the altar of glory,
That the earliest, the loveliest of flowers I'd entwine, _30
Though with millions of blood-reeking victims 'twas gory,
Though the tears of the widow polluted its shrine,
Though around it the orphans, the fatherless pine?
Oh! Fame, all thy glories I'd yield for a tear
To shed on the grave of a heart so sincere. _35
***
LOVE.
[Published (without title) by Hogg, "Life of Shelley", 1858; dated 1811.
The title is Rossetti's (1870). ]
Why is it said thou canst not live
In a youthful breast and fair,
Since thou eternal life canst give,
Canst bloom for ever there?
Since withering pain no power possessed, _5
Nor age, to blanch thy vermeil hue,
Nor time's dread victor, death, confessed,
Though bathed with his poison dew,
Still thou retain'st unchanging bloom,
Fixed tranquil, even in the tomb. _10
And oh! when on the blest, reviving,
The day-star dawns of love,
Each energy of soul surviving
More vivid, soars above,
Hast thou ne'er felt a rapturous thrill, _15
Like June's warm breath, athwart thee fly,
O'er each idea then to steal,
When other passions die?
Felt it in some wild noonday dream,
When sitting by the lonely stream, _20
Where Silence says, 'Mine is the dell';
And not a murmur from the plain,
And not an echo from the fell,
Disputes her silent reign.
***
ON A FETE AT CARLTON HOUSE: FRAGMENT.
[Published by Rossetti, "Complete Poetical Works of P. B. S. ", 1870;
dated 1811. ]
By the mossy brink,
With me the Prince shall sit and think;
Shall muse in visioned Regency,
Rapt in bright dreams of dawning Royalty.
***
TO A STAR.
[Published (without title) by Hogg, "Life of Shelley", 1858; dated 1811.
The title is Rossetti's (1870). ]
Sweet star, which gleaming o'er the darksome scene
Through fleecy clouds of silvery radiance fliest,
Spanglet of light on evening's shadowy veil,
Which shrouds the day-beam from the waveless lake,
Lighting the hour of sacred love; more sweet _5
Than the expiring morn-star's paly fires:--
Sweet star! When wearied Nature sinks to sleep,
And all is hushed,--all, save the voice of Love,
Whose broken murmurings swell the balmy blast
Of soft Favonius, which at intervals _10
Sighs in the ear of stillness, art thou aught but
Lulling the slaves of interest to repose
With that mild, pitying gaze? Oh, I would look
In thy dear beam till every bond of sense
Became enamoured-- _15
***
TO MARY WHO DIED IN THIS OPINION.
[Published by Rossetti, "Complete Poetical Works of P. B. S. ", 1870;
dated 1810-11. ]
1.
Maiden, quench the glare of sorrow
Struggling in thine haggard eye:
Firmness dare to borrow
From the wreck of destiny;
For the ray morn's bloom revealing _5
Can never boast so bright an hue
As that which mocks concealing,
And sheds its loveliest light on you.
2.
Yet is the tie departed
Which bound thy lovely soul to bliss? _10
Has it left thee broken-hearted
In a world so cold as this?
Yet, though, fainting fair one,
Sorrow's self thy cup has given,
Dream thou'lt meet thy dear one,
Never more to part, in Heaven. _15
3.
Existence would I barter
For a dream so dear as thine,
And smile to die a martyr
On affection's bloodless shrine. _20
Nor would I change for pleasure
That withered hand and ashy cheek,
If my heart enshrined a treasure
Such as forces thine to break.
***
A TALE OF SOCIETY AS IT IS: FROM FACTS, 1811.
[Published (from Esdaile manuscript with title as above) by Rossetti,
"Complete Poetical Works of P. B. S. ", 1870. Rossetti's title is "Mother
and Son". ]
1.
She was an aged woman; and the years
Which she had numbered on her toilsome way
Had bowed her natural powers to decay.
She was an aged woman; yet the ray
Which faintly glimmered through her starting tears, _5
Pressed into light by silent misery,
Hath soul's imperishable energy.
She was a cripple, and incapable
To add one mite to gold-fed luxury:
And therefore did her spirit dimly feel _10
That poverty, the crime of tainting stain,
Would merge her in its depths, never to rise again.
2.
One only son's love had supported her.
She long had struggled with infirmity,
Lingering to human life-scenes; for to die, _15
When fate has spared to rend some mental tie,
Would many wish, and surely fewer dare.
But, when the tyrant's bloodhounds forced the child
For his cursed power unhallowed arms to wield--
Bend to another's will--become a thing _20
More senseless than the sword of battlefield--
Then did she feel keen sorrow's keenest sting;
And many years had passed ere comfort they would bring.
3.
For seven years did this poor woman live
In unparticipated solitude. _25
Thou mightst have seen her in the forest rude
Picking the scattered remnants of its wood.
If human, thou mightst then have learned to grieve.
The gleanings of precarious charity
Her scantiness of food did scarce supply. _30
The proofs of an unspeaking sorrow dwelt
Within her ghastly hollowness of eye:
Each arrow of the season's change she felt.
Yet still she groans, ere yet her race were run,
One only hope: it was--once more to see her son. _35
4.
It was an eve of June, when every star
Spoke peace from Heaven to those on earth that live.
She rested on the moor. 'Twas such an eve
When first her soul began indeed to grieve:
Then he was here; now he is very far. _40
The sweetness of the balmy evening
A sorrow o'er her aged soul did fling,
Yet not devoid of rapture's mingled tear:
A balm was in the poison of the sting.
This aged sufferer for many a year _45
Had never felt such comfort. She suppressed
A sigh--and turning round, clasped William to her breast!
5.
And, though his form was wasted by the woe
Which tyrants on their victims love to wreak,
Though his sunk eyeballs and his faded cheek _50
Of slavery's violence and scorn did speak,
Yet did the aged woman's bosom glow.
The vital fire seemed re-illumed within
By this sweet unexpected welcoming.
Oh, consummation of the fondest hope _55
That ever soared on Fancy's wildest wing!
Oh, tenderness that foundst so sweet a scope!
Prince who dost pride thee on thy mighty sway,
When THOU canst feel such love, thou shalt be great as they!
6.
Her son, compelled, the country's foes had fought, _60
Had bled in battle; and the stern control
Which ruled his sinews and coerced his soul
Utterly poisoned life's unmingled bowl,
And unsubduable evils on him brought.
He was the shadow of the lusty child _65
Who, when the time of summer season smiled,
Did earn for her a meal of honesty,
And with affectionate discourse beguiled
The keen attacks of pain and poverty;
Till Power, as envying her this only joy, _70
From her maternal bosom tore the unhappy boy.
7.
And now cold charity's unwelcome dole
Was insufficient to support the pair;
And they would perish rather than would bear
The law's stern slavery, and the insolent stare _75
With which law loves to rend the poor man's soul--
The bitter scorn, the spirit-sinking noise
Of heartless mirth which women, men, and boys
Wake in this scene of legal misery.
. . .
NOTES:
_28 grieve Esdaile manuscript; feel, 1870.
_37 to those on earth that live Esdaile manuscripts; omitted, 1870.
***
TO THE REPUBLICANS OF NORTH AMERICA.
[Published (from the Esdaile manuscript with title as above) by
Rossetti, "Complete Poetical Works of P. B. S. ", 1870; dated 1812.
Rossetti's title is "The Mexican Revolution". ]
1.
Brothers! between you and me
Whirlwinds sweep and billows roar:
Yet in spirit oft I see
On thy wild and winding shore
Freedom's bloodless banners wave,-- _5
Feel the pulses of the brave
Unextinguished in the grave,--
See them drenched in sacred gore,--
Catch the warrior's gasping breath
Murmuring 'Liberty or death! ' _10
2.
Shout aloud! Let every slave,
Crouching at Corruption's throne,
Start into a man, and brave
Racks and chains without a groan:
And the castle's heartless glow, _15
And the hovel's vice and woe,
Fade like gaudy flowers that blow--
Weeds that peep, and then are gone
Whilst, from misery's ashes risen,
Love shall burst the captive's prison. _20
3.
Cotopaxi! bid the sound
Through thy sister mountains ring,
Till each valley smile around
At the blissful welcoming!
And, O thou stern Ocean deep, _25
Thou whose foamy billows sweep
Shores where thousands wake to weep
Whilst they curse a villain king,
On the winds that fan thy breast
Bear thou news of Freedom's rest! _30
4.
Can the daystar dawn of love,
Where the flag of war unfurled
Floats with crimson stain above
The fabric of a ruined world?
Never but to vengeance driven _35
When the patriot's spirit shriven
Seeks in death its native Heaven!
There, to desolation hurled,
Widowed love may watch thy bier,
Balm thee with its dying tear. _40
***
TO IRELAND.
[Published, 1-10, by Rossetti, "Complete Poetical Works of P. B. S. ",
1870; 11-17, 25-28, by Dowden, "Life of Shelley", 1887; 18-24 by
Kingsland, "Poet-Lore", July, 1892. Dated 1812. ]
1.
Bear witness, Erin! when thine injured isle
Sees summer on its verdant pastures smile,
Its cornfields waving in the winds that sweep
The billowy surface of thy circling deep!
Thou tree whose shadow o'er the Atlantic gave _5
Peace, wealth and beauty, to its friendly wave, its blossoms fade,
And blighted are the leaves that cast its shade;
Whilst the cold hand gathers its scanty fruit,
Whose chillness struck a canker to its root. _10
2.
I could stand
Upon thy shores, O Erin, and could count
The billows that, in their unceasing swell,
Dash on thy beach, and every wave might seem
An instrument in Time the giant's grasp, _15
To burst the barriers of Eternity.
Proceed, thou giant, conquering and to conquer;
March on thy lonely way! The nations fall
Beneath thy noiseless footstep; pyramids
That for millenniums have defied the blast, _20
And laughed at lightnings, thou dost crush to nought.
Yon monarch, in his solitary pomp,
Is but the fungus of a winter day
That thy light footstep presses into dust.
Thou art a conqueror, Time; all things give way _25
Before thee but the 'fixed and virtuous will';
The sacred sympathy of soul which was
When thou wert not, which shall be when thou perishest.
. . .
***
ON ROBERT EMMET'S GRAVE.
[Published from the Esdaile manuscript book by Dowden,
"Life of Shelley", 1887; dated 1812. ]
. . .
6.
No trump tells thy virtues--the grave where they rest
With thy dust shall remain unpolluted by fame,
Till thy foes, by the world and by fortune caressed,
Shall pass like a mist from the light of thy name.
7.
When the storm-cloud that lowers o'er the day-beam is gone, _5
Unchanged, unextinguished its life-spring will shine;
When Erin has ceased with their memory to groan,
She will smile through the tears of revival on thine.
***
THE RETROSPECT: CWM ELAN, 1812.
[Published from the Esdaile manuscript book by Dowden,
"Life of Shelley", 1887. ]
A scene, which 'wildered fancy viewed
In the soul's coldest solitude,
With that same scene when peaceful love
Flings rapture's colour o'er the grove,
When mountain, meadow, wood and stream _5
With unalloying glory gleam,
And to the spirit's ear and eye
Are unison and harmony.
The moonlight was my dearer day;
Then would I wander far away, _10
And, lingering on the wild brook's shore
To hear its unremitting roar,
Would lose in the ideal flow
All sense of overwhelming woe;
Or at the noiseless noon of night _15
Would climb some heathy mountain's height,
And listen to the mystic sound
That stole in fitful gasps around.
I joyed to see the streaks of day
Above the purple peaks decay, _20
And watch the latest line of light
Just mingling with the shades of night;
For day with me was time of woe
When even tears refused to flow;
Then would I stretch my languid frame _25
Beneath the wild woods' gloomiest shade,
And try to quench the ceaseless flame
That on my withered vitals preyed;
Would close mine eyes and dream I were
On some remote and friendless plain, _30
And long to leave existence there,
If with it I might leave the pain
That with a finger cold and lean
Wrote madness on my withering mien.
It was not unrequited love _35
That bade my 'wildered spirit rove;
'Twas not the pride disdaining life,
That with this mortal world at strife
Would yield to the soul's inward sense,
Then groan in human impotence, _40
And weep because it is not given
To taste on Earth the peace of Heaven.
'Twas not that in the narrow sphere
Where Nature fixed my wayward fate
There was no friend or kindred dear _45
Formed to become that spirit's mate,
Which, searching on tired pinion, found
Barren and cold repulse around;
Oh, no! yet each one sorrow gave
New graces to the narrow grave. _50
For broken vows had early quelled
The stainless spirit's vestal flame;
Yes! whilst the faithful bosom swelled,
Then the envenomed arrow came,
And Apathy's unaltering eye _55
Beamed coldness on the misery;
And early I had learned to scorn
The chains of clay that bound a soul
Panting to seize the wings of morn,
And where its vital fires were born _60
To soar, and spur the cold control
Which the vile slaves of earthly night
Would twine around its struggling flight.
Oh, many were the friends whom fame
Had linked with the unmeaning name, _65
Whose magic marked among mankind
The casket of my unknown mind,
Which hidden from the vulgar glare
Imbibed no fleeting radiance there.
My darksome spirit sought--it found _70
A friendless solitude around.
For who that might undaunted stand,
The saviour of a sinking land,
Would crawl, its ruthless tyrant's slave,
And fatten upon Freedom's grave, _75
Though doomed with her to perish, where
The captive clasps abhorred despair.
They could not share the bosom's feeling,
Which, passion's every throb revealing,
Dared force on the world's notice cold _80
Thoughts of unprofitable mould,
Who bask in Custom's fickle ray,
Fit sunshine of such wintry day!
They could not in a twilight walk
Weave an impassioned web of talk, _85
Till mysteries the spirits press
In wild yet tender awfulness,
Then feel within our narrow sphere
How little yet how great we are!
But they might shine in courtly glare, _90
Attract the rabble's cheapest stare,
And might command where'er they move
A thing that bears the name of love;
They might be learned, witty, gay,
Foremost in fashion's gilt array, _95
On Fame's emblazoned pages shine,
Be princes' friends, but never mine!
Ye jagged peaks that frown sublime,
Mocking the blunted scythe of Time,
Whence I would watch its lustre pale _100
Steal from the moon o'er yonder vale
Thou rock, whose bosom black and vast,
Bared to the stream's unceasing flow,
Ever its giant shade doth cast
On the tumultuous surge below: _105
Woods, to whose depths retires to die
The wounded Echo's melody,
And whither this lone spirit bent
The footstep of a wild intent:
Meadows! whose green and spangled breast _110
These fevered limbs have often pressed,
Until the watchful fiend Despair
Slept in the soothing coolness there!
Have not your varied beauties seen
The sunken eye, the withering mien, _115
Sad traces of the unuttered pain
That froze my heart and burned my brain.
How changed since Nature's summer form
Had last the power my grief to charm,
Since last ye soothed my spirit's sadness, _120
Strange chaos of a mingled madness!
Changed! --not the loathsome worm that fed
In the dark mansions of the dead,
Now soaring through the fields of air,
And gathering purest nectar there, _125
A butterfly, whose million hues
The dazzled eye of wonder views,
Long lingering on a work so strange,
Has undergone so bright a change.
How do I feel my happiness? _130
I cannot tell, but they may guess
Whose every gloomy feeling gone,
Friendship and passion feel alone;
Who see mortality's dull clouds
Before affection's murmur fly, _135
Whilst the mild glances of her eye
Pierce the thin veil of flesh that shrouds
The spirit's inmost sanctuary.
O thou! whose virtues latest known,
First in this heart yet claim'st a throne; _140
Whose downy sceptre still shall share
The gentle sway with virtue there;
Thou fair in form, and pure in mind,
Whose ardent friendship rivets fast
The flowery band our fates that bind, _145
Which incorruptible shall last
When duty's hard and cold control
Has thawed around the burning soul,--
The gloomiest retrospects that bind
With crowns of thorn the bleeding mind, _150
The prospects of most doubtful hue
That rise on Fancy's shuddering view,--
Are gilt by the reviving ray
Which thou hast flung upon my day.
***
FRAGMENT OF A SONNET.
TO HARRIET.
[Published from the Esdaile manuscript book by Dowden,
"Life of Shelley", 1887; dated August 1, 1812. ]
Ever as now with Love and Virtue's glow
May thy unwithering soul not cease to burn,
Still may thine heart with those pure thoughts o'erflow
Which force from mine such quick and warm return.
***
TO HARRIET.
[Published, 5-13, by Forman, "Poetical Works of P. B. S. ", 1876;
58-69, by Shelley, "Notes to Queen Mab", 1813;
and entire (from the Esdaile manuscript book) by Dowden,
"Life of Shelley", 1887; dated 1812. ]
It is not blasphemy to hope that Heaven
More perfectly will give those nameless joys
Which throb within the pulses of the blood
And sweeten all that bitterness which Earth
Infuses in the heaven-born soul. O thou _5
Whose dear love gleamed upon the gloomy path
Which this lone spirit travelled, drear and cold,
Yet swiftly leading to those awful limits
Which mark the bounds of Time and of the space
When Time shall be no more; wilt thou not turn _10
Those spirit-beaming eyes and look on me,
Until I be assured that Earth is Heaven,
And Heaven is Earth? --will not thy glowing cheek,
Glowing with soft suffusion, rest on mine,
And breathe magnetic sweetness through the frame _15
Of my corporeal nature, through the soul
Now knit with these fine fibres? I would give
The longest and the happiest day that fate
Has marked on my existence but to feel
ONE soul-reviving kiss. . . O thou most dear, _20
'Tis an assurance that this Earth is Heaven,
And Heaven the flower of that untainted seed
Which springeth here beneath such love as ours.
Harriet! let death all mortal ties dissolve,
But ours shall not be mortal! The cold hand _25
Of Time may chill the love of earthly minds
Half frozen now; the frigid intercourse
Of common souls lives but a summer's day;
It dies, where it arose, upon this earth.
But ours! oh, 'tis the stretch of Fancy's hope _30
To portray its continuance as now,
Warm, tranquil, spirit-healing; nor when age
Has tempered these wild ecstasies, and given
A soberer tinge to the luxurious glow
Which blazing on devotion's pinnacle _35
Makes virtuous passion supersede the power
Of reason; nor when life's aestival sun
To deeper manhood shall have ripened me;
Nor when some years have added judgement's store
To all thy woman sweetness, all the fire _40
Which throbs in thine enthusiast heart; not then
Shall holy friendship (for what other name
May love like ours assume? ), not even then
Shall Custom so corrupt, or the cold forms
Of this desolate world so harden us, _45
As when we think of the dear love that binds
Our souls in soft communion, while we know
Each other's thoughts and feelings, can we say
Unblushingly a heartless compliment,
Praise, hate, or love with the unthinking world, _50
Or dare to cut the unrelaxing nerve
That knits our love to virtue. Can those eyes,
Beaming with mildest radiance on my heart
To purify its purity, e'er bend
To soothe its vice or consecrate its fears? _55
Never, thou second Self! Is confidence
So vain in virtue that I learn to doubt
The mirror even of Truth? Dark flood of Time,
Roll as it listeth thee; I measure not
By month or moments thy ambiguous course. _60
Another may stand by me on thy brink,,
And watch the bubble whirled beyond his ken,
Which pauses at my feet. The sense of love,
The thirst for action, and the impassioned thought
Prolong my being; if I wake no more, _65
My life more actual living will contain
Than some gray veteran's of the world's cold school,
Whose listless hours unprofitably roll
By one enthusiast feeling unredeemed,
Virtue and Love! unbending Fortitude, _70
Freedom, Devotedness and Purity!
That life my Spirit consecrates to you.
***
SONNET.
TO A BALLOON LADEN WITH KNOWLEDGE.
[Published from the Esdaile manuscript book by Dowden,
"Life of Shelley", 1887; dated August, 1812. ]
Bright ball of flame that through the gloom of even
Silently takest thine aethereal way,
And with surpassing glory dimm'st each ray
Twinkling amid the dark blue depths of Heaven,--
Unlike the fire thou bearest, soon shalt thou _5
Fade like a meteor in surrounding gloom,
Whilst that, unquenchable, is doomed to glow
A watch-light by the patriot's lonely tomb;
A ray of courage to the oppressed and poor;
A spark, though gleaming on the hovel's hearth, _10
Which through the tyrant's gilded domes shall roar;
A beacon in the darkness of the Earth;
A sun which, o'er the renovated scene,
Shall dart like Truth where Falsehood yet has been.
***
SONNET.
ON LAUNCHING SOME BOTTLES FILLED WITH KNOWLEDGE INTO THE BRISTOL CHANNEL.
[Published from the Esdaile manuscript book by Dowden,
"Life of Shelley", 1887; dated August, 1812. ]
Vessels of heavenly medicine! may the breeze
Auspicious waft your dark green forms to shore;
Safe may ye stem the wide surrounding roar
Of the wild whirlwinds and the raging seas;
And oh! if Liberty e'er deigned to stoop _5
From yonder lowly throne her crownless brow,
Sure she will breathe around your emerald group
The fairest breezes of her West that blow.
Yes! she will waft ye to some freeborn soul
Whose eye-beam, kindling as it meets your freight, _10
Her heaven-born flame in suffering Earth will light,
Until its radiance gleams from pole to pole,
And tyrant-hearts with powerless envy burst
To see their night of ignorance dispersed.
***
THE DEVIL'S WALK.
A BALLAD.
[Published as a broadside by Shelley, 1812. ]
1.
Once, early in the morning, Beelzebub arose,
With care his sweet person adorning,
He put on his Sunday clothes.
2.
He drew on a boot to hide his hoof, _5
He drew on a glove to hide his claw,
His horns were concealed by a Bras Chapeau,
And the Devil went forth as natty a Beau
As Bond-street ever saw.
3.
He sate him down, in London town, _10
Before earth's morning ray;
With a favourite imp he began to chat,
On religion, and scandal, this and that,
Until the dawn of day.
4.
And then to St. James's Court he went, _15
And St. Paul's Church he took on his way;
He was mighty thick with every Saint,
Though they were formal and he was gay.
5.
The Devil was an agriculturist,
And as bad weeds quickly grow, _20
In looking over his farm, I wist,
He wouldn't find cause for woe.
6.
He peeped in each hole, to each chamber stole,
His promising live-stock to view;
Grinning applause, he just showed them his claws, _25
And they shrunk with affright from his ugly sight,
Whose work they delighted to do.
7.
Satan poked his red nose into crannies so small
One would think that the innocents fair,
Poor lambkins! were just doing nothing at all _30
But settling some dress or arranging some ball,
But the Devil saw deeper there.
8.
A Priest, at whose elbow the Devil during prayer
Sate familiarly, side by side,
Declared that, if the Tempter were there, _35
His presence he would not abide.
Ah! ah! thought Old Nick, that's a very stale trick,
For without the Devil, O favourite of Evil,
In your carriage you would not ride.
9.
Satan next saw a brainless King, _40
Whose house was as hot as his own;
Many Imps in attendance were there on the wing,
They flapped the pennon and twisted the sting,
Close by the very Throne.
10.
Ah! ah! thought Satan, the pasture is good, _45
My Cattle will here thrive better than others;
They dine on news of human blood,
They sup on the groans of the dying and dead,
And supperless never will go to bed;
Which will make them fat as their brothers. _50
11.
Fat as the Fiends that feed on blood,
Fresh and warm from the fields of Spain,
Where Ruin ploughs her gory way,
Where the shoots of earth are nipped in the bud,
Where Hell is the Victor's prey, _55
Its glory the meed of the slain.
12.
Fat--as the Death-birds on Erin's shore,
That glutted themselves in her dearest gore,
And flitted round Castlereagh,
When they snatched the Patriot's heart, that HIS grasp _60
Had torn from its widow's maniac clasp,
--And fled at the dawn of day.
13.
Fat--as the Reptiles of the tomb,
That riot in corruption's spoil,
That fret their little hour in gloom, _65
And creep, and live the while.
14.
Fat as that Prince's maudlin brain,
Which, addled by some gilded toy,
Tired, gives his sweetmeat, and again
Cries for it, like a humoured boy. _70
15.
For he is fat,--his waistcoat gay,
When strained upon a levee day,
Scarce meets across his princely paunch;
And pantaloons are like half-moons
Upon each brawny haunch. _75
16.
How vast his stock of calf! when plenty
Had filled his empty head and heart,
Enough to satiate foplings twenty,
Could make his pantaloon seams start.
17.
The Devil (who sometimes is called Nature), _80
For men of power provides thus well,
Whilst every change and every feature,
Their great original can tell.
18.
Satan saw a lawyer a viper slay,
That crawled up the leg of his table, _85
It reminded him most marvellously
Of the story of Cain and Abel.
19.
The wealthy yeoman, as he wanders
His fertile fields among,
And on his thriving cattle ponders, _90
Counts his sure gains, and hums a song;
Thus did the Devil, through earth walking,
Hum low a hellish song.
20.
For they thrive well whose garb of gore
Is Satan's choicest livery, _95
And they thrive well who from the poor
Have snatched the bread of penury,
And heap the houseless wanderer's store
On the rank pile of luxury.
21.
The Bishops thrive, though they are big; _100
The Lawyers thrive, though they are thin;
For every gown, and every wig,
Hides the safe thrift of Hell within.
22.
Thus pigs were never counted clean,
Although they dine on finest corn; _105
And cormorants are sin-like lean,
Although they eat from night to morn.
23.
Oh! why is the Father of Hell in such glee,
As he grins from ear to ear?
