--- DICTIONARIES (in Dictionaries, in Quotes, in Chapters)

hyperion ::: n. --> The god of the sun; in the later mythology identified with Apollo, and distinguished for his beauty.

Hyperion
An {MS-DOS} {personal computer} that was
manufactured in Kanata (near Ottawa, Ontario, Canada) in the
mid-1980s. It received considerable government subsidies and,
while it was considered well-designed and manufactured and a
real threat to the {Compaq Portable}, the Ottawa firm that
designed it was unable to beat {Compaq}.
(1997-07-21)

hyperion ::: n. --> The god of the sun; in the later mythology identified with Apollo, and distinguished for his beauty.

Hyperion (Greek) [from hyper above, high + ion he that goes] The sun god, commonly joined with Helios in Homer, as Hyperion Helios or Helios Hyperion. Also a titan descended from Ouranos and Gaia (heaven and earth) who pairs with Thea. Strictly speaking, the sun god and the titan are one, the distinction lying in this individual’s being viewed from two different aspects.

Hyperion ::: (computer) An MS-DOS personal computer that was manufactured in Kanata (near Ottawa, Ontario, Canada) in the mid-1980s. It received considerable and a real threat to the Compaq Portable, the Ottawa firm that designed it was unable to beat Compaq. (1997-07-21)

--- QUOTES [3 / 3 - 59 / 59] (in Dictionaries, in Quotes, in Chapters)

KEYS (10k)

   2 Sri Aurobindo
   1 M Alan Kazlev

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   13 Dan Simmons

   5 Rick Riordan

   4 William Shakespeare

   3 Sri Aurobindo
   3 Michael Lewis

   2 Poetical Works of John Keats
   2 Percy Bysshe Shelley
   2 John Keats
   2 Homer

   2 Edmund Spenser

   2 Edith Hamilton

1:Now from his cycle sleepless and vast round the dance of the earth-globeGold Hyperion rose in the wake of the dawn like the eyeballFlaming of God revealed by his uplifted luminous eyelid. ~ Sri Aurobindo, Collected Poems 5.1.01 - Ilion,

2:Masters of Worldbuilding. Creating imaginary worlds is certainly one of the more satisfying and addictive of creative pastimes. Of course, no one has ever surpassed Tolkien in worldbuilding stakes. And Frank Herbert should be included in 2nd place on this honourable list. Other worthwhile mentions are Lovecraft (Cthulhu mythos), Asimov (Foundation), Niven (Known Space), Jack Kirby (Marvel), William Gibson (the Sprawl), Stephen Baxter (Xeelee), Marc Miller (Traveller), C.J.Cherryh (Alliance-Union), Dan Simmons (Hyperion Cantos), David Weber (Honorverse), Iain M Banks (Culture), Alastair Reynolds (Revelation Space/Galactic North), Kameron Hurley (Bel Dames), and Ann Lecke (Ancillary trilogy), to name just a few. ~ M Alan Kazlev,

3:1st row Homer, Shakespeare, Valmiki2nd row Dante, Kalidasa, Aeschylus, Virgil, Milton3rd row Goethe...I am not prepared to classify all the poets in the universe - it was the front bench or benches you asked for. By others I meant poets like Lucretius, Euripides, Calderon, Corneille, Hugo. Euripides (Medea, Bacchae and other plays) is a greater poet than Racine whom you want to put in the first ranks. If you want only the very greatest, none of these can enter - only Vyasa and Sophocles. Vyasa could very well claim a place beside Valmiki, Sophocles beside Aeschylus. The rest, if you like, you can send into the third row with Goethe, but it is something of a promotion about which one can feel some qualms. Spenser too, if you like; it is difficult to draw a line.Shelley, Keats and Wordsworth have not been brought into consideration although their best work is as fine poetry as any written, but they have written nothing on a larger scale which would place them among the greatest creators. If Keats had finished Hyperion (without spoiling it), if Shelley had lived, or if Wordsworth had not petered out like a motor car with insufficient petrol, it might be different, but we have to take things as they are. As it is, all began magnificently, but none of them finished, and what work they did, except a few lyrics, sonnets, short pieces and narratives, is often flawed and unequal. If they had to be admitted, what about at least fifty others in Europe and Asia? ~ Sri Aurobindo, Letters On Poetry And Art ,

*** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***

1:he could not save his men, for they perished through their own sheer folly in eating the cattle of the Sun-god Hyperion; ~ Homer

2:The members of Hyperion’s crew were now pigs, for a very simple reason: they all had a stake in Clark’s Internet businesses. ~ Michael Lewis

3:Sol found their tracts the usual combination of double talk and navel lint-gathering common to most religions. ~ Dan Simmons, Hyperion (1989), Chapter 4

4:The programmers decided the steps everyone on board Hyperion would need to take to do everything from dimming the lights to raising the sails. ~ Michael Lewis

5:I think when you love music, you love a lot of it. Now when it comes to jazz, it's very much in the hyperions of height. You go exploring every night. ~ Charles Lloyd

6:six male, six female. The males were OCEANUS, COEUS, CRIUS, HYPERION, IAPETUS and KRONOS. The females, THEIA, THEMIS, MNEMOSYNE, PHOEBE, TETHYS and RHEA. ~ Stephen Fry

7:As you can imagine, they got along great, though how they got any sleep with Hyperion glowing all night and Theia giggling, “Shiny! Shiny!” I don’t know. ~ Rick Riordan

8:You cannot imprison me!" He bellowed. "I am Hyperion! I am-" The bark closed over his face. Grover took his pipes from his mouth. "You are a very nice maple tree. ~ Rick Riordan

9:You cannot imprison me!" He bellowed. "I am Hyperion! I am-" The bark closed over his face. Grover took his pipes from his mouth. "You are a very nice maple tree. ~ Rick Riordan

10:So excellent a king; that was, to this, Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother That he might not beteem the winds of heaven Visit her face too roughly. ~ William Shakespeare

11:In context the computer programmers appeared idle. They sat quietly, stared into their screens and sipped cappuccinos. And yet they were by far the most important people on board Hyperion. ~ Michael Lewis

12:Sol! Take your daughter, your only daughter Rachel, whom you love, and go to the world called Hyperion and offer her there as a burnt offering at one of the places of which I shall tell you. ~ Dan Simmons

13:Sol! Take your daughter, your only daughter, Rachel, whom you love, and go to the world called Hyperion and offer her there as a burnt offering at one of the places of which I shall tell you. ~ Dan Simmons

14:Sol! Take your daughter, your only daughter Rachel, whom you love, and go to the world called Hyperion and offer her there as a burnt offering at one of the places of which I shall tell you.” And ~ Dan Simmons

15:I am tired of this city. I am tired of its pagan pretensions and false histories. Hyperion is a poet’s world devoid of poetry. Keats itself is a mixture of tawdry, false classicism and mindless, boomtown energy. ~ Dan Simmons

16:Stand as I did after throwing the switch, a murderer, a betrayer, but still proud, feet firmly planted on Hyperion’s shifting sand, head held high, fist raised against the sky, crying “A plague on both your houses! ~ Dan Simmons

17:Now from his cycle sleepless and vast round the dance of the earth-globe Gold Hyperion rose in the wake of the dawn like the eyeball Flaming of God revealed by his uplifted luminous eyelid. ~ Sri Aurobindo, Collected Poems, Ilion,

18:Among us we represent islands of time as well as separate oceans of perspective. Or perhaps more aptly put, each of us may hold a piece to a puzzle no one else has been able to solve since humankind first landed on Hyperion. ~ Dan Simmons

19:Why do you not disintegrate? Tartarus mused. You are nothing. You are even weaker than Krios and Hyperion. “I am Bob,” said Bob. Tartarus hissed. What is that? What is Bob? “I choose to be more than Iapetus,” said the Titan. “You do not control me. I am not like my brothers. ~ Rick Riordan

20:Laches faded away, leaving Miriam standing facing Hyperion, the Metigen who had orchestrated the slaughter of over fifty million people a short year ago. There were limits to even deals with the devil, lines which should never be crossed…but she was beginning to wonder when she might find one. ~ G S Jennsen

21:The other notable Titans were OCEAN, the river that was supposed to encircle the earth; his wife TETHYS; HYPERION, the father of the sun, the moon, and the dawn; MNEMOSYNE, which means Memory; THEMIS, usually translated by Justice; and IAPETUS, important because of his sons, ATLAS, who bore the world on his shoulders, ~ Edith Hamilton

22:Our apartment was filled with photos of us, notes I wrote to myself about us, holos of us on Hyperion, but … you know. In the morning he would be an absolute stranger. By afternoon I began to believe what we’d had, even if I couldn’t remember. By evening I’d be crying in his arms … then, sooner or later, I’d go to sleep. It’s better this way.” Rachel ~ Dan Simmons

23:The other notable Titans were OCEAN, the river that was supposed to encircle the earth; his wife TETHYS; HYPERION, the father of the sun, the moon, and the dawn; MNEMOSYNE, which means Memory; THEMIS, usually translated by Justice; and IAPETUS, important because of his sons, ATLAS, who bore the world on his shoulders, and PROMETHEUS, who was the savior of mankind. ~ Edith Hamilton

24:The notion developed that the breach of reason with nature was a necessary one; that man had to make it in order to develop his powers of reason and abstraction. Schiller makes this point in his Letters on the Aestethic education of Man, as does Hölderin in his Hyperion Fragment. The belief was that the human destiny was to return to nature at a higher level, having made a synthesis of reason and desire. ~ Charles Taylor

25:Any more than you?” Allander sneered, rising to the bait. “You’re a personified superego, a walking shadow that’s run out of gas. Compare you to me. Hyperion to a satyr. I’ve lived through more than you can dream. I’ve lived the fantasies. I’m the only one to do it without a Greek wrap and I don’t need any forks for my eyes. Try checking that at the door, Doctor. Let that roll around on your back for a while. ~ Gregg Hurwitz

26:The voice, sounding more than ever to Sol like some cut-rate holie director’s shallow idea of what God’s voice should sound like, came again: “Sol! You must listen well. The future of humankind depends upon your obedience in this matter. You must take your daughter, your daughter Rachel whom you love, and go to the world called Hyperion and offer her there as a burnt offering at one of the places of which I shall tell you.” And ~ Dan Simmons

27:I stared at him for a moment, and then I exploded. “You threw a knife at me!” “I did,” he replied calmly. “You hit me with the knife!” “I did.” He leaned forward, dropping his foot onto the floor. “As I told Seth, unbinding you myself would not be easy. I wish I hadn’t had to do it that way. The last thing I wanted was to cause you pain. I didn’t enjoy any part of that—well, besides the look on Hyperion’s face—but the only way for me to finish unbinding you was to pass you through a mortal death. ~ Jennifer L Armentrout

28:I found no muse on Hyperion during those first years. For many, the expansion of distance because of limited transportation—EMVs were unreliable, skimmers scarce—and the contraction of artificial consciousness due to absence of datasphere, no access to the All Thing, and only one fatline transmitter—all led to a renewal of creative energies, a new realization of what it meant to be human and an artist. Or so I heard. No muse appeared. My verse continued to be technically proficient and dead as Huck Finn’s cat. I decided to kill myself. ~ Dan Simmons

29:Elephant Memories. William Morrow, 1988. Moss, Cynthia J., Harvey Croze, and Phyllis C. Lee, eds. The Amboseli Elephants. University of Chicago Press, 2011. Masson, Jeffrey Moussaieff, and Susan McCarthy. When Elephants Weep. Delacorte Press, 1995. O’Connell, Caitlin. The Elephant’s Secret Sense. Free Press, 2007. Poole, Joyce. Coming of Age with Elephants. Hyperion, 1996. Sheldrick, Daphne. Love, Life, and Elephants. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2012. And dozens of academic papers written by researchers who continue to study elephants and elephant society. There ~ Jodi Picoult

30:The ship did not respond to queries. Without the ship, there could be no fatline relay to the Ousters, the Web, or anywhere else beyond Hyperion. Normal comm bands were down. ‘Could the ship have been destroyed?’ Sol asked the Consul. ‘No. The message is being received, just not responded to. Gladstone still has the ship in quarantine.’ Sol squinted out over the barrens to where the mountains shimmered in the heat haze. Several klicks closer, the ruins of the City of Poets rose jaggedly against the skyline. ‘Just as well,’ he said. ‘We have one deus ex machina too many as it is.’ Paul ~ Dan Simmons

31:Sing, O Muse, of the man of many devices, who wandered full many ways after he had sacked the sacred citadel of Troy. Many were the men whose cities he saw and whose mind he learned, aye, and many the woes he suffered in his heart upon the sea, seeking to win his own life and the return of his comrades. Yet even so he saved not his comrades, though he desired it sore, for through their own blind folly they perished—fools, who devoured the kine of Helios Hyperion; but he took from them the day of their returning. Of these things, goddess, daughter of Zeus, beginning where thou wilt, tell thou even unto us. ~ Homer

32:I am tired of this city. I am tired of its pagan pretensions and false histories. Hyperion is a poet’s world devoid of poetry. Keats itself is a mixture of tawdry, false classicism and mindless, boomtown energy. There are three Zen Gnostic assemblies and four High Muslim mosques in the town, but the real houses of worship are the countless saloons and brothels, the huge marketplaces handling the fiberplastic shipments from the south, and the Shrike Cult temples where lost souls hide their suicidal hopelessness behind a shield of shallow mysticism. The whole planet reeks of mysticism without revelation. ~ Dan Simmons

33:Sol! Take your daughter, your only daughter Rachel, Whom you love, and go to the world called Hyperion and offer her there as a burnt offering at one of the places of which I shall tell you.” Sol hesitated and looked back to Rachel. The baby’s eyes were deep and luminous as she looked up at her father. Sol felt the unspoken yes. Holding her tightly, he stepped forward into the darkness and raised his voice against the silence: “Listen! There will be no more offerings, neither child nor parent. There will be no more sacrifices for anyone other than our fellow human. The time of obedience and atonement is past. ~ Dan Simmons

34:Outside, under the marquee of the hotel, he stood a moment as he did each night beneath the marquee of the Hotel Hyperion, while he decided what direction to take, what to do. And suddenly, realizing it was not the Hotel Hyperion, that the circumstances were quite different, he felt loneliness spring up like a dark forest all around him. The odd thing was, he felt no impulse to hurry after her, to find her somehow. What would he have to offer her except the history of weakness, loneliness, and inadequacy, the decline and fall of himself? He himself was the core of the loneliness around him, and its core was inadequacy. He was inadequate even in love. ~ Patricia Highsmith

35:Masters of Worldbuilding. Creating imaginary worlds is certainly one of the more satisfying and addictive of creative pastimes. Of course, no one has ever surpassed Tolkien in worldbuilding stakes. And Frank Herbert should be included in 2nd place on this honourable list. Other worthwhile mentions are Lovecraft (Cthulhu mythos), Asimov (Foundation), Niven (Known Space), Jack Kirby (Marvel), William Gibson (the Sprawl), Stephen Baxter (Xeelee), Marc Miller (Traveller), C.J.Cherryh (Alliance-Union), Dan Simmons (Hyperion Cantos), David Weber (Honorverse), Iain M Banks (Culture), Alastair Reynolds (Revelation Space/Galactic North), Kameron Hurley (Bel Dames), and Ann Lecke (Ancillary trilogy), to name just a few.    ~ M Alan Kazlev,

36:Stop this!” he shouted. “Your woodland magic is no match for a Titan!” But the more he struggled, the faster the roots grew. They curled about his body, thickening and hardening into bark. His golden armor melted into the wood, becoming part of a large trunk. The music continued. Hyperion’s forces backed up in astonishment as their leader was absorbed. He stretched out his arms and they became branches, from which smaller branches shot out and grew leaves. The tree grew taller and thicker, until only the Titan’s face was visible in the middle of the trunk. “You cannot imprison me!” he bellowed. “I am Hyperion! I am—” The bark closed over his face. Grover took his pipes from his mouth. “You are a very nice maple tree. ~ Rick Riordan

37:It seemed that Abraham had offered to murder his son to test a phantom. It seemed that Sol had brought his dying daughter through hundreds of light-years and innumerable hardships in response to nothing. But now, as the Sphinx loomed above him and the first hint of sunrise paled Hyperion’s sky, Sol realized that he had responded to a force more basic and persuasive than the Shrike’s terror or pain’s dominion. If he was right—and he did not know but felt—then love was as hardwired into the structure of the universe as gravity and matter/antimatter. There was room for some sort of God not in the web between the walls, nor in the singularity cracks in the pavement, nor somewhere out before and beyond the sphere of things … but in the very warp and woof of things. Evolving as the universe evolved. Learning as the learning-able parts of the universe learned. Loving as humankind loved. ~ Dan Simmons

38:Hyperion: We're going to die here today. Thor: Aye...But let it be on our terms. One more time. Our very...Huurggg!...best. (Thor is unable to lift the mjolnir from an alternate universe - Thorr's hammer of unworthiness) Thor: Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! So be it. If this is the end let me not meet is as The Unworthy...but as my father's son. The occasion demands I offer you a drink, Hyperion, but unfortunately, I have none. Hyperion: That's because we drank it all, brother. Thor: Yes. We did.. Nothing left to do now but the other thing. Hyperion: I just want to say... for some time I believed I survived the death of two worlds -- now I know it just took a while to catch up with me. It's a dark thing, what my life became... you have made it better, Odinson. Will you wait for me in Valhalla? Thor: Brother... this day, I will race you there. *Against the bleak nothing of dead space, two gods fell to many. The sun shone one last time. There was lightning, and thunder... and then silence.* ~ Jonathan Hickman

39:I sing the glorious Power with azure eyes, Athenian Pallas! tameless, chaste, and wise, Tritogenia, town-preserving Maid, Revered and mighty; from his awful head Whom Jove brought forth, in warlike armour dressed, Golden, all radiant! wonder strange possessed The everlasting Gods that Shape to see, Shaking a javelin keen, impetuously Rush from the crest of Aegis-bearing Jove; Fearfully Heaven was shaken, and did move Beneath the might of the Cerulean-eyed; Earth dreadfully resounded, far and wide; And, lifted from its depths, the sea swelled high In purple billows, the tide suddenly Stood still, and great Hyperions son long time Checked his swift steeds, till, where she stood sublime, Pallas from her immortal shoulders threw The arms divine; wise Jove rejoiced to view. Child of the Aegis-bearer, hail to thee, Nor thine nor others praise shall unremembered be. Published by Mrs. Shelley, Poetical Works, 1839, 2nd edition; dated 1818. ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley, Homers Hymn To Minerva

40:The Temple of Artemis WHEN EOS ARRIVED AT HER usual spot in the sky Saturday morning, ready to bring forth the dawn, she looked up at Nyx and waved the notescroll her friend had given her. “Yes! I can come see your statue!” she shouted. Nyx flashed Eos a smile, already reeling in her cape. “Hooray!” she whooped. “I’m going home to sleep for a few hours and then Hades will give me a ride to the temple at Ephesus. He’s got four stallions to pull his chariot, which means his can go much faster than mine!” At the mention of Hades, Eos paled. A student at MOA, he was also godboy of the Underworld, where Nyx lived, and where mortals like Tithonus would go when they died. It was also where some unlucky immortals were imprisoned right now—those who had fought against Zeus in battle or defied him in some other way. As a matter of fact, her sad-mad-dad problem was all tied into the Underworld. Because one of those immortal prisoners was her dad, Hyperion, the god of light! “Hey! Eos! The dawn?” With a start, Eos realized Nyx had finished reeling in her entire cape and was ready to ride away. ~ Joan Holub

41:Offspring of Jove, Calliope, once more To the bright Sun, thy hymn of music pour; Whom to the child of star-clad Heaven and Earth Euryphaessa, large-eyed nymph, brought forth; Euryphaessa, the famed sister fair Of great Hyperion, who to him did bear A race of loveliest children; the young Morn, Whose arms are like twin roses newly born, The fair-haired Moon, and the immortal Sun, Who borne by heavenly steeds his race doth run Unconquerably, illuming the abodes Of mortal Men and the eternal Gods. Fiercely look forth his awe-inspiring eyes, Beneath his golden helmet, whence arise And are shot forth afar, clear beams of light; His countenance, with radiant glory bright, Beneath his graceful locks far shines around, And the light vest with which his limbs are bound, Of woof aethereal delicately twined, Glows in the stream of the uplifting wind. His rapid steeds soon bear him to the West; Where their steep flight his hands divine arrest, And the fleet car with yoke of gold, which he Sends from bright Heaven beneath the shadowy sea. Published by Mrs. Shelley, Poetical Works, 1839, 2nd edition; dated 1818. ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley, Homers Hymn To The Sun

42:Homer's Hymn to the Sun Published by Mrs. Shelley, "Poetical Works", 1839, 2nd edition; dated 1818. Offspring of Jove, Calliope, once more To the bright Sun, thy hymn of music pour; Whom to the child of star-clad Heaven and Earth Euryphaessa, large-eyed nymph, brought forth; Euryphaessa, the famed sister fair Of great Hyperion, who to him did bear A race of loveliest children; the young Morn, Whose arms are like twin roses newly born, The fair-haired Moon, and the immortal Sun, Who borne by heavenly steeds his race doth run Unconquerably, illuming the abodes Of mortal Men and the eternal Gods. Fiercely look forth his awe-inspiring eyes, Beneath his golden helmet, whence arise And are shot forth afar, clear beams of light; His countenance, with radiant glory bright, Beneath his graceful locks far shines around, And the light vest with which his limbs are bound, Of woof aethereal delicately twined, Glows in the stream of the uplifting wind. His rapid steeds soon bear him to the West; Where their steep flight his hands divine arrest, And the fleet car with yoke of gold, which he Sends from bright Heaven beneath the shadowy sea ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley

43:O, that this too too solid flesh would melt Thaw and resolve itself into a dew! Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd His canon 'gainst self-slaughter! O God! God! How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, Seem to me all the uses of this world! Fie on't! ah fie! 'tis an unweeded garden, That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature Possess it merely. That it should come to this! But two months dead: nay, not so much, not two: So excellent a king; that was, to this, Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother That he might not beteem the winds of heaven Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth! Must I remember? why, she would hang on him, As if increase of appetite had grown By what it fed on: and yet, within a month-- Let me not think on't--Frailty, thy name is woman!-- A little month, or ere those shoes were old With which she follow'd my poor father's body, Like Niobe, all tears:--why she, even she-- O, God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason, Would have mourn'd longer--married with my uncle, My father's brother, but no more like my father Than I to Hercules: within a month: Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears Had left the flushing in her galled eyes, She married. O, most wicked speed, to post With such dexterity to incestuous sheets! It is not nor it cannot come to good: But break, my heart; for I must hold my tongue. ~ William Shakespeare

44:1st row Homer, Shakespeare, Valmiki 2nd row Dante, Kalidasa, Aeschylus, Virgil, Milton 3rd row Goethe ... I am not prepared to classify all the poets in the universe - it was the front bench or benches you asked for. By others I meant poets like Lucretius, Euripides, Calderon, Corneille, Hugo. Euripides (Medea, Bacchae and other plays) is a greater poet than Racine whom you want to put in the first ranks. If you want only the very greatest, none of these can enter - only Vyasa and Sophocles. Vyasa could very well claim a place beside Valmiki, Sophocles beside Aeschylus. The rest, if you like, you can send into the third row with Goethe, but it is something of a promotion about which one can feel some qualms. Spenser too, if you like; it is difficult to draw a line. Shelley, Keats and Wordsworth have not been brought into consideration although their best work is as fine poetry as any written, but they have written nothing on a larger scale which would place them among the greatest creators. If Keats had finished Hyperion (without spoiling it), if Shelley had lived, or if Wordsworth had not petered out like a motor car with insufficient petrol, it might be different, but we have to take things as they are. As it is, all began magnificently, but none of them finished, and what work they did, except a few lyrics, sonnets, short pieces and narratives, is often flawed and unequal. If they had to be admitted, what about at least fifty others in Europe and Asia? ~ Sri Aurobindo, Letters On Poetry And Art,

45:Milton's Eve! Milton's Eve! ... Milton tried to see the first woman; but Cary, he saw her not ... I would beg to remind him that the first men of the earth were Titans, and that Eve was their mother: from her sprang Saturn, Hyperion, Oceanus; she bore Prometheus" -- "Pagan that you are! what does that signify?" "I say, there were giants on the earth in those days: giants that strove to scale heaven. The first woman's breast that heaved with life on this world yielded the daring which could contend with Omnipotence: the stregth which could bear a thousand years of bondage, -- the vitality which could feed that vulture death through uncounted ages, -- the unexhausted life and uncorrupted excellence, sisters to immortality, which after millenniums of crimes, struggles, and woes, could conceive and bring forth a Messiah. The first woman was heaven-born: vast was the heart whence gushed the well-spring of the blood of nations; and grand the undegenerate head where rested the consort-crown of creation. ... I saw -- I now see -- a woman-Titan: her robe of blue air spreads to the outskirts of the heath, where yonder flock is grazing; a veil white as an avalanche sweeps from hear head to her feet, and arabesques of lighting flame on its borders. Under her breast I see her zone, purple like that horizon: through its blush shines the star of evening. Her steady eyes I cannot picture; they are clear -- they are deep as lakes -- they are lifted and full of worship -- they tremble with the softness of love and the lustre of prayer. Her forehead has the expanse of a cloud, and is paler than the early moon, risen long before dark gathers: she reclines her bosom on the ridge of Stilbro' Moor; her mighty hands are joined beneath it. So kneeling, face to face she speaks with God. That Eve is Jehova's daughter, as Adam was His son. ~ Charlotte Bront

46:What infinite heart's-ease Must kings neglect, that private men enjoy! And what have kings, that privates have not too, Save ceremony, save general ceremony? And what art thou, thou idle ceremony? What kind of god art thou, that suffer'st more Of mortal griefs than do thy worshippers? What are thy rents? what are thy comings in? O ceremony, show me but thy worth! What is thy soul of adoration? Art thou aught else but place, degree and form, Creating awe and fear in other men? Wherein thou art less happy being fear'd Than they in fearing. What drink'st thou oft, instead of homage sweet, But poison'd flattery? O, be sick, great greatness, And bid thy ceremony give thee cure! Think'st thou the fiery fever will go out With titles blown from adulation? Will it give place to flexure and low bending? Canst thou, when thou command'st the beggar's knee, Command the health of it? No, thou proud dream, That play'st so subtly with a king's repose; I am a king that find thee, and I know 'Tis not the balm, the sceptre and the ball, The sword, the mace, the crown imperial, The intertissued robe of gold and pearl, The farced title running 'fore the king, The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp That beats upon the high shore of this world, No, not all these, thrice-gorgeous ceremony, Not all these, laid in bed majestical, Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave, Who with a body fill'd and vacant mind Gets him to rest, cramm'd with distressful bread; Never sees horrid night, the child of hell, But, like a lackey, from the rise to set Sweats in the eye of Phoebus and all night Sleeps in Elysium; next day after dawn, Doth rise and help Hyperion to his horse, And follows so the ever-running year, With profitable labour, to his grave: And, but for ceremony, such a wretch, Winding up days with toil and nights with sleep, Had the fore-hand and vantage of a king. The slave, a member of the country's peace, Enjoys it; but in gross brain little wots What watch the king keeps to maintain the peace, Whose hours the peasant best advantages. ~ William Shakespeare

47:Tithonus So when the verdure of his life was shed, With all the grace of ripened manlihead, And on his locks, but now so lovable, Old age like desolating winter fell, Leaving them white and flowerless and forlorn: Then from his bed the Goddess of the Morn Softly withheld, yet cherished him no less With pious works of pitying tenderness; Till when at length with vacant, heedless eyes, And hoary height bent down none otherwise Than burdened willows bend beneath their weight Of snow when winter winds turn temperate, -So bowed with years -- when still he lingered on: Then to the daughter of Hyperion This counsel seemed the best: for she, afar By dove-gray seas under the morning star, Where, on the wide world's uttermost extremes, Her amber-walled, auroral palace gleams, High in an orient chamber bade prepare An everlasting couch, and laid him there, And leaving, closed the shining doors. But he, Deathless by Jove's compassionless decree, Found not, as others find, a dreamless rest. There wakeful, with half-waking dreams oppressed, Still in an aural, visionary haze Float round him vanished forms of happier days; Still at his side he fancies to behold The rosy, radiant thing beloved of old; And oft, as over dewy meads at morn, Far inland from a sunrise coast is borne The drowsy, muffled moaning of the sea, Even so his voice flows on unceasingly, -Lisping sweet names of passion overblown, Breaking with dull, persistent undertone The breathless silence that forever broods Round those colossal, lustrous solitudes. Times change. Man's fortune prospers, or it falls. Change harbors not in those eternal halls And tranquil chamber where Tithonus lies. 122 But through his window there the eastern skies Fall palely fair to the dim ocean's end. There, in blue mist where air and ocean blend, The lazy clouds that sail the wide world o'er Falter and turn where they can sail no more. There singing groves, there spacious gardens blow -Cedars and silver poplars, row on row, Through whose black boughs on her appointed night, Flooding his chamber with enchanted light, Lifts the full moon's immeasurable sphere, Crimson and huge and wonderfully near. ~ Alan Seeger

48:Upon the King! Let us our lives, our souls, Our debts, our careful wives, Our children, and our sins, lay on the King! We must bear all. O hard condition, Twin-born with greatness, subject to the breath Of every fool, whose sense no more can feel But his own wringing! What infinite heart's ease Must kings neglect that private men enjoy! And what have kings that privates have not too, Save ceremony- save general ceremony? And what art thou, thou idol Ceremony? What kind of god art thou, that suffer'st more Of mortal griefs than do thy worshippers? What are thy rents? What are thy comings-in? O Ceremony, show me but thy worth! What is thy soul of adoration? Art thou aught else but place, degree, and form, Creating awe and fear in other men? Wherein thou art less happy being fear'd Than they in fearing. What drink'st thou oft, instead of homage sweet, But poison'd flattery? O, be sick, great greatness, And bid thy ceremony give thee cure! Thinks thou the fiery fever will go out With titles blown from adulation? Will it give place to flexure and low bending? Canst thou, when thou command'st the beggar's knee, Command the health of it? No, thou proud dream, That play'st so subtly with a king's repose. I am a king that find thee; and I know 'Tis not the balm, the sceptre, and the ball, The sword, the mace, the crown imperial, The intertissued robe of gold and pearl, The farced tide running fore the king, The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp That beats upon the high shore of this world- No, not all these, thrice gorgeous ceremony, Not all these, laid in bed majestical, Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave Who, with a body fill'd and vacant mind, Gets him to rest, cramm'd with distressful bread; Never sees horrid night, the child of hell; But, like a lackey, from the rise to set Sweats in the eye of Pheebus, and all night Sleeps in Elysium; next day, after dawn, Doth rise and help Hyperion to his horse; And follows so the ever-running year With profitable labour, to his grave. And but for ceremony, such a wretch, Winding up days with toil and nights with sleep, Had the fore-hand and vantage of a king. The slave, a member of the country's peace, Enjoys it; but in gross brain little wots What watch the king keeps to maintain the peace Whose hours the peasant best advantages. ~ William Shakespeare

49:Glossa Time goes by, time comes along, All is old and all is new; What is right and what is wrong, You must think and ask of you; Have no hope and have no fear, Waves that rise can never hold; If they urge or if they cheer, You remain aloof and cold. To our sight a lot will glisten, Many sounds will reach our ear; Who could take the time to listen And remember all we hear? Keep aside from all that patter, Seek yourself, far from the throng When with loud and idle clatter Time goes by, time comes along. Nor forget the tongue of reason Or its even scales depress When the moment, changing season, Wears the mask of happiness - It is born of reason's slumber And may last a wink as true: For the one who knows its number All is old and all is new. Be as to a play, spectator, As the world unfolds before: You will know the heart of matter Should they act two parts or four; When they cry or tear asunder From your seat enjoy along And you'll learn from art to wonder What is right and what is wrong. Past and future, ever blending, Are the twin sides of same page: New start will begin with ending When you know to learn from age; All that was or be tomorrow We have in the present, too; But what's vain and futile sorrow You must think and ask of you; For the living cannot sever From the means we've always had: Now, as years ago, and ever, Men are happy or are sad: Other masks, same play repeated; Diff'rent tongues, same words to hear; Of your dreams so often cheated, Have no hope and have no fear. Hope not when the villains cluster By success and glory drawn: Fools with perfect lack of luster Will outshine Hyperion! Fear it not, they'll push each other To reach higher in the fold, Do not side with them as brother, Waves that rise can never hold. Sounds of siren songs call steady Toward golden nets, astray; Life attracts you into eddies To change actors in the play; Steal aside from crowd and bustle, Do not look, seem not to hear From your path, away from hustle, If they urge or if they cheer; If they reach for you, go faster, Hold your tongue when slanders yell; Your advice they cannot master, Don't you know their measure well? Let them talk and let them chatter, Let all go past, young and old; Unattached to man or matter, You remain aloof and cold. You remain aloof and cold If they urge or if they cheer; Waves that rise can never hold, Have no hope and have no fear; You must think and ask of you What is right and what is wrong; All is old and all is new, Time goes by, time comes along. ~ Mihai Eminescu

50:Thus in altemate uproar and sad peace, Amazed were those Titans utterly. O leave them, Muse! O leave them to their woes; For thou art weak to sing such tumults dire: A solitary sorrow best befits Thy lips, and antheming a lonely grief. Leave them, O Muse! for thou anon wilt find Many a fallen old Divinity Wandering in vain about bewildered shores. Meantime touch piously the Delphic harp, And not a wind of heaven but will breathe In aid soft warble from the Dorian flute; For lo! 'tis for the Father of all verse. Flush everything that hath a vermeil hue, Let the rose glow intense and warm the air, And let the clouds of even and of morn Float in voluptuous fleeces o'er the hills; Let the red wine within the goblet boil, Cold as a bubbling well; let faint-lipp'd shells, On sands, or in great deeps, vermilion turn Through all their labyrinths; and let the maid Blush keenly, as with some warm kiss surpris'd. Chief isle of the embowered Cyclades, Rejoice, O Delos, with thine olives green, And poplars, and lawn-shading palms, and beech, In which the Zephyr breathes the loudest song, And hazels thick, dark-stemm'd beneath the shade: Apollo is once more the golden theme! Where was he, when the Giant of the sun Stood bright, amid the sorrow of his peers? Together had he left his mother fair And his twin-sister sleeping in their bower, And in the morning twilight wandered forth Beside the osiers of a rivulet, Full ankle-deep in lilies of the vale. The nightingale had ceas'd, and a few stars Were lingering in the heavens, while the thrush Began calm-throated. Throughout all the isle There was no covert, no retired cave, Unhaunted by the murmurous noise of waves, Though scarcely heard in many a green recess. He listen'd, and he wept, and his bright tears Went trickling down the golden bow he held. Thus with half-shut suffused eyes he stood, While from beneath some cumbrous boughs hard by With solemn step an awful Goddess came, And there was purport in her looks for him, Which he with eager guess began to read Perplex'd, the while melodiously he said: "How cam'st thou over the unfooted sea? Or hath that antique mien and robed form Mov'd in these vales invisible till now? Sure I have heard those vestments sweeping o'er The fallen leaves, when I have sat alone In cool mid-forest. Surely I have traced The rustle of those ample skirts about These grassy solitudes, and seen the flowers Lift up their heads, as still the whisper pass'd. Goddess! I have beheld those eyes before, And their eternal calm, and all that face, Or I have dream'd."-"Yes," said the supreme shape, "Thou hast dream'd of me; and awaking up Didst find a lyre all golden by thy side, Whose strings touch'd by thy fingers, all the vast Unwearied ear of the whole universe Listen'd in pain and pleasure at the birth Of such new tuneful wonder. Is't not strange That thou shouldst weep, so gifted? Tell me, youth, What sorrow thou canst feel; for I am sad When thou dost shed a tear: explain thy griefs To one who in this lonely isle hath been The watcher of thy sleep and hours of life, From the young day when first thy infant hand Pluck'd witless the weak flowers, till thine arm Could bend that bow heroic to all times. Show thy heart's secret to an ancient Power Who hath forsaken old and sacred thrones For prophecies of thee, and for the sake Of loveliness new born."-Apollo then, With sudden scrutiny and gloomless eyes, Thus answer'd, while his white melodious throat Throbb'd with the syllables.-"Mnemosyne! Thy name is on my tongue, I know not how; Why should I tell thee what thou so well seest? Why should I strive to show what from thy lips Would come no mystery? For me, dark, dark, And painful vile oblivion seals my eyes: I strive to search wherefore I am so sad, Until a melancholy numbs my limbs; And then upon the grass I sit, and moan, Like one who once had wings.-O why should I Feel curs'd and thwarted, when the liegeless air Yields to my step aspirant? why should I Spurn the green turf as hateful to my feet? Goddess benign, point forth some unknown thing: Are there not other regions than this isle? What are the stars? There is the sun, the sun! And the most patient brilliance of the moon! And stars by thousands! Point me out the way To any one particular beauteous star, And I will flit into it with my lyre, And make its silvery splendor pant with bliss. I have heard the cloudy thunder: Where is power? Whose hand, whose essence, what divinity Makes this alarum in the elements, While I here idle listen on the shores In fearless yet in aching ignorance? O tell me, lonely Goddess, by thy harp, That waileth every morn and eventide, Tell me why thus I rave about these groves! Mute thou remainest-Mute! yet I can read A wondrous lesson in thy silent face: Knowledge enormous makes a God of me. Names, deeds, gray legends, dire events, rebellions, Majesties, sovran voices, agonies, Creations and destroyings, all at once Pour into the wide hollows of my brain, And deify me, as if some blithe wine Or bright elixir peerless I had drunk, And so become immortal."-Thus the God, While his enkindled eyes, with level glance Beneath his white soft temples, steadfast kept Trembling with light upon Mnemosyne. Soon wild commotions shook him, and made flush All the immortal fairness of his limbs; Most like the struggle at the gate of death; Or liker still to one who should take leave Of pale immortal death, and with a pang As hot as death's is chill, with fierce convulse Die into life: so young Apollo anguish'd: His very hair, his golden tresses famed, Kept undulation round his eager neck. During the pain Mnemosyne upheld Her arms as one who prophesied. At length Apollo shriek'd;-and lo! from all his limbs Celestial * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * (last lines): 'Leigh Hunt says of this part of the fragment, "It strikes us that there is something too effeminate and human in the way in which Apollo receives the exaltation which his wisdom is giving him. He weeps and wonders somewhat too fondly; but his powers gather nobly on him as he proceeds." I confess that I should be disposed to rank all these symptoms of convulsion and hysteria in the same category as the fainting of lovers which Keats so frequently represented, -- a kind of thing which his astonishing powers of progress would infallibly have' outgrown had he lived a year or two longer."' ~ Poetical Works of John Keats, ed. H. Buxton Forman, Crowell publ. 1895. by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes ~ John Keats, Hyperion. Book III

51:Lucretius Lucilla, wedded to Lucretius, found Her master cold; for when the morning flush Of passion and the first embrace had died Between them, tho' he loved her none the less, Yet often when the woman heard his foot Return from pacings in the field, and ran To greet him with a kiss, the master took Small notice, or austerely, for his mind Half buried in some weightier argument, Or fancy-borne perhaps upon the rise And long roll of the hexameter -- he past To turn and ponder those three hundred scrolls Left by the Teacher, whom he held divine. She brook'd it not, but wrathful, petulant Dreaming some rival, sought and found a witch Who brew'd the philtre which had power, they said To lead an errant passion home again. And this, at times, she mingled with his drink, And this destroy'd him; for the wicked broth Confused the chemic labor of the blood, And tickling the brute brain within the man's Made havoc among those tender cells, and check'd His power to shape. He loathed himself, and once After a tempest woke upon a morn That mock'd him with returning calm, and cried: "Storm in the night! for thrice I heard the rain Rushing; and once the flash of a thunderbolt -Methought I never saw so fierce a fork -Struck out the streaming mountain-side, and show'd A riotous confluence of watercourses Blanching and billowing in a hollow of it, Where all but yester-eve was dusty-dry. "Storm, and what dreams, ye holy Gods, what dreams! For thrice I waken'd after dreams. Perchance We do but recollect the dreams that come Just ere the waking. Terrible: for it seem'd A void was made in Nature, all her bonds 338 Crack'd; and I saw the flaring atom-streams And torrents of her myriad universe, Ruining along the illimitable inane, Fly on to clash together again, and make Another and another frame of things For ever. That was mine, my dream, I knew it -Of and belonging to me, as the dog With inward yelp and restless forefoot plies His function of the woodland; but the next! I thought that all the blood by Sylla shed Came driving rainlike down again on earth, And where it dash'd the reddening meadow, sprang No dragon warriors from Cadmean teeth, For these I thought my dream would show to me, But girls, Hetairai, curious in their art, Hired animalisms, vile as those that made The mulberry-faced Dictator's orgies worse Than aught they fable of the quiet Gods. And hands they mixt, and yell'd and round me drove In narrowing circles till I yell'd again Half-suffocated, and sprang up, and saw -Was it the first beam of my latest day? "Then, then, from utter gloom stood out the The breasts of Helen, and hoveringly a sword Now over and now under, now direct, Pointed itself to pierce, but sank down shamed At all that beauty; and as I stared, a fire, The fire that left a roofless Ilion, Shot out of them, and scorch'd me that I woke. "Is this thy vengeance, holy Venus, thine, Because I would not one of thine own doves, Not even a rose, were offered to thee? thine, Forgetful how my rich proemion makes Thy glory fly along the Italian field, In lays that will outlast thy deity? "Deity? nay, thy worshippers. My tongue Trips, or I speak profanely. Which of these Angers thee most, or angers thee at all? Not if thou be'st of those who, far aloof 339 From envy, hate and pity, and spite and scorn, Live the great life which all our greatest fain Would follow, centred in eternal calm. "Nay, if thou canst, Goddess, like ourselves Touch, and be touch'd, then would I cry to thee To kiss thy Mavors, roll thy tender arms Round him, and keep him from the lust of blood That makes a steaming slaughter-house of Rome. "Ay, but I meant not thee; I meant riot her Whom all the pines of Ida shook to see Slide from that quiet heaven of hers, and tempt The Trojan, while his neatherds were abroad Nor her that o'er her wounded hunter wept Her deity false in human-amorous tears; Nor whom her beardless apple-arbiter Decided fairest. Rather, O ye Gods, Poet-like, as the great Sicilian called Calliope to grace his golden verse -Ay, and this Kypris also -- did I take That popular name of thine to shadow forth The all-generating powers and genial heat Of Nature, when she strikes thro' the thick blood Of cattle, and light is large, and lambs are glad Nosing the mother's udder, and the bird Makes his heart voice amid the blaze of flowers; Which things appear the work of mighty Gods. "The Gods! and if I go my work is left Unfinish'd -- if I go. The Gods, who haunt The lucid interspace of world and world, Where never creeps a cloud, or moves a wind, Nor ever falls the least white star of mow Nor ever lowest roll of thunder moans, Nor sound of human sorrow mounts to mar Their sacred everlasting calm! and such, Not all so fine, nor so divine a calm Not such, nor all unlike it, man may gain Letting his own life go. The Gods, the Godsl If all be atoms, how then should the Gods 340 Being atomic not be dissoluble, Not follow the great law? My master held That Gods there are, for all men so believe. I prest my footsteps into his, and meant Surely to lead my Memmius in a train Of fiowery clauses onward to the proof That Gods there are, and deathless. Meant? I meant? I have forgotten what I meant, my mind Stumbles, and all my faculties are lamed. "Look where another of our Gods, the Sun Apollo, Delius, or of older use All-seeing Hyperion -- what you will -Has mounted yonder; since he never sware, Except his wrath were wreak'd on wretched man, That he would only shine among the dead Hereafter -- tales! for never yet on earth Could dead flesh creep, or bits of roasting ox Moan round the spit -- nor knows he what he sees; King of the East altho' he seem, and girt With song and flame and fragrance, slowly lifts His golden feet on those empurpled stairs That climb into the windy halls of heaven And here he glances on an eye new-born, And gets for greeting but a wail of pain; And here he stays upon a freezing orb That fain would gaze upon him to the last; And here upon a yellow eyelid fallen And closed by those who mourn a friend in vain, Not thankful that his troubles are no more. And me, altho' his fire is on my face Blinding, he sees not, nor at all can tell Whether I mean this day to end myself. Or lend an ear to Plato where he says, That men like soldiers may not quit the post Allotted by the Gods. But he that holds The Gods are careless, wherefore need he care Greatly for them, nor rather plunge at once, Being troubled, wholly out of sight, and sink Past earthquake -- ay, and gout and stone, that break Body toward death, and palsy, death-in-life, And wretched age -- and worst disease of all, 341 These prodigies of myriad nakednesses, And twisted shapes of lust, unspeakable, Abominable, strangers at my hearth Not welcome, harpies miring every dish, The phantom husks of something foully done, And fleeting thro' the boundless universe, And blasting the long quiet of my breast With animal heat and dire insanity? "How should the mind, except it loved them, clasp These idols to herself? or do they fly Now thinner, and now thicker, like the flakes In a fall of snow, and so press in, perforce Of multitude, as crowds that in an hour Of civic tumult jam the doors, and bear The keepers down, and throng, their rags and the The basest, far into that council-hall Where sit the best and stateliest of the land? ³Can I not fling this horror off me again, Seeing with how great ease Nature can smile Balmier and nobler from her bath of storm, At random ravage? and how easily The mountain there has cast his cloudy slough, Now towering o'er him in serenest air, A mountain o'er a mountain, -- ay, and within All hollow as the hopes and fears of men? "But who was he that in the garden snared Picus and Faunus, rustic Gods? a tale To laugh at -- more to laugh at in myself -For look! what is it? there? yon arbutus Totters; a noiseless riot underneath Strikes through the wood, sets all the tops quivering -- ; The mountain quickens into Nymph and Faun, And here an Oread -- how the sun delights To glance and shift about her slippery sides, And rosy knees and supple roundedness, And budded bosom-peaks -- who this way runs Before the rest! -- a satyr, a satyr, see, Follows; but him I proved impossible Twy-natured is no nature. Yet he draws 342 Nearer and nearer, and I scan him now Beastlier than any phantom of his kind That ever butted his rough brother-brute For lust or lusty blood or provender. I hate, abhor, spit, sicken at him; and she Loathes him as well; such a precipitate heel, Fledged as it were with Mercury's ankle-wing, Whirls her to me -- ;but will she fling herself Shameless upon me? Catch her, goatfoot! nay, Hide, hide them, million-myrtled wilderness, And cavern-shadowing laurels, hide! do I wish -What? -- ;that the bush were leafless? or to whelm All of them in one massacre? O ye Gods I know you careless, yet, behold, to you From childly wont and ancient use I call -I thought I lived securely as yourselves -No lewdness, narrowing envy, monkey-spite, No madness of ambition, avarice, none; No larger feast than under plane or pine With neighbors laid along the grass, to take Only such cups as left us friendly-warm, Affirming each his own philosophy Nothing to mar the sober majesties Of settled, sweet, Epicurean life. But now it seems some unseen monster lays His vast and filthy hands upon my will, Wrenching it backward into his, and spoils My bliss in being; and it was not great, For save when shutting reasons up in rhythm, Or Heliconian honey in living words, To make a truth less harsh, I often grew Tired of so much within our little life Or of so little in our little life -Poor little life that toddles half an hour Crown'd with a flower or two, and there an end -And since the nobler pleasure seems to fade, Why should I, beastlike as I find myself, Not manlike end myself? -- our privilege -- ; What beast has heart to do it? And what man What Roman would be dragg'd in triumph thus? Not I; not he, who bears one name with her 343 Whose death-blow struck the dateless doom of kings, When, brooking not the Tarquin in her veins, She made her blood in sight of Collatine And all his peers, flushing the guiltless air, Spout from the maiden fountain in her heart. And from it sprang the Commonwealth, which breaks As I am breaking now! "And therefore now Let her, that is the womb and tomb of all Great Nature, take, and forcing far apart Those blind beginnings that have made me man, Dash them anew together at her will Thro' all her cycles -- into man once more, Or beast or bird or fish, or opulent flower. But till this cosmic order everywhere Shatter'd into one earthquake m one day Cracks all to pieces, -- and that hour perhaps Is not so far when momentary man Shall seem no more a something to himself, But he, his hopes and hates, his homes and fanes And even his bones long laid within the grave, The very sides of the grave itself shall pass, Vanishing, atom and void, atom and void, Into the unseen for ever, -- till that hour, My golden work in which I told a truth That stays the rolling Ixionian wheel, And numbs the Fury's ringlet-snake, and plucks The mortal soul from out immortal hell Shall stand. Ay, surely; then it fails at last And perishes as I must, for O Thou Passionless bride, divine Tranquillity, Yearn'd after by the wisest of the wise Who fail to find thee, being as thou art Without one pleasure and without one pain, Howbeit I know thou surely must be mine Or soon or late, yet out of season, thus I woo thee roughly, for thou carest not How roughly men may woo thee so they win -- ; Thus -- thus -- the soul flies out and dies in the air With that he drove the knife into his side. 344 She heard him raging, heard him fall, ran in, Beat breast, tore hair, cried out upon herself As having fail'd in duty to him, shriek'd That she but meant to win him back, fell on him Clasp'd, kiss'd him, wail'd. He answer'd, "Care not thou! Thy duty? What is duty? Fare thee well!" ~ Alfred Lord Tennyson

52:Just at the self-same beat of Time's wide wings Hyperion slid into the rustled air, And Saturn gain'd with Thea that sad place Where Cybele and the bruised Titans mourn'd. It was a den where no insulting light Could glimmer on their tears; where their own groans They felt, but heard not, for the solid roar Of thunderous waterfalls and torrents hoarse, Pouring a constant bulk, uncertain where. Crag jutting forth to crag, and rocks that seem'd Ever as if just rising from a sleep, Forehead to forehead held their monstrous horns; And thus in thousand hugest phantasies Made a fit roofing to this nest of woe. Instead of thrones, hard flint they sat upon, Couches of rugged stone, and slaty ridge Stubborn'd with iron. All were not assembled: Some chain'd in torture, and some wandering. Caus, and Gyges, and Briareus, Typhon, and Dolor, and Porphyrion, With many more, the brawniest in assault, Were pent in regions of laborious breath; Dungeon'd in opaque element, to keep Their clenched teeth still clench'd, and all their limbs Lock'd up like veins of metal, crampt and screw'd; Without a motion, save of their big hearts Heaving in pain, and horribly convuls'd With sanguine feverous boiling gurge of pulse. Mnemosyne was straying in the world; Far from her moon had Phoebe wandered; And many else were free to roam abroad, But for the main, here found they covert drear. Scarce images of life, one here, one there, Lay vast and edgeways; like a dismal cirque Of Druid stones, upon a forlorn moor, When the chill rain begins at shut of eve, In dull November, and their chancel vault, The Heaven itself, is blinded throughout night. Each one kept shroud, nor to his neighbour gave Or word, or look, or action of despair. Creus was one; his ponderous iron mace Lay by him, and a shatter'd rib of rock Told of his rage, ere he thus sank and pined. Iapetus another; in his grasp, A serpent's plashy neck; its barbed tongue Squeez'd from the gorge, and all its uncurl'd length Dead: and because the creature could not spit Its poison in the eyes of conquering Jove. Next Cottus: prone he lay, chin uppermost, As though in pain; for still upon the flint He ground severe his skull, with open mouth And eyes at horrid working. Nearest him Asia, born of most enormous Caf, Who cost her mother Tellus keener pangs, Though feminine, than any of her sons: More thought than woe was in her dusky face, For she was prophesying of her glory; And in her wide imagination stood Palm-shaded temples, and high rival fanes By Oxus or in Ganges' sacred isles. Even as Hope upon her anchor leans, So leant she, not so fair, upon a tusk Shed from the broadest of her elephants. Above her, on a crag's uneasy shelve, Upon his elbow rais'd, all prostrate else, Shadow'd Enceladus; once tame and mild As grazing ox unworried in the meads; Now tiger-passion'd, lion-thoughted, wroth, He meditated, plotted, and even now Was hurling mountains in that second war, Not long delay'd, that scar'd the younger Gods To hide themselves in forms of beast and bird. Not far hence Atlas; and beside him prone Phorcus, the sire of Gorgons. Neighbour'd close Oceanus, and Tethys, in whose lap Sobb'd Clymene among her tangled hair. In midst of all lay Themis, at the feet Of Ops the queen; all clouded round from sight, No shape distinguishable, more than when Thick night confounds the pine-tops with the clouds: And many else whose names may not be told. For when the Muse's wings are air-ward spread, Who shall delay her flight? And she must chaunt Of Saturn, and his guide, who now had climb'd With damp and slippery footing from a depth More horrid still. Above a sombre cliff Their heads appear'd, and up their stature grew Till on the level height their steps found ease: Then Thea spread abroad her trembling arms Upon the precincts of this nest of pain, And sidelong fix'd her eye on Saturn's face: There saw she direst strife; the supreme God At war with all the frailty of grief, Of rage, of fear, anxiety, revenge, Remorse, spleen, hope, but most of all despair. Against these plagues he strove in vain; for Fate Had pour'd a mortal oil upon his head, A disanointing poison: so that Thea, Affrighted, kept her still, and let him pass First onwards in, among the fallen tribe.   As with us mortal men, the laden heart Is persecuted more, and fever'd more, When it is nighing to the mournful house Where other hearts are sick of the same bruise; So Saturn, as he walk'd into the midst, Felt faint, and would have sunk among the rest, But that he met Enceladus's eye, Whose mightiness, and awe of him, at once Came like an inspiration; and he shouted, "Titans, behold your God!" at which some groan'd; Some started on their feet; some also shouted; Some wept, some wail'd, all bow'd with reverence; And Ops, uplifting her black folded veil, Show'd her pale cheeks, and all her forehead wan, Her eye-brows thin and jet, and hollow eyes. There is a roaring in the bleak-grown pines When Winter lifts his voice; there is a noise Among immortals when a God gives sign, With hushing finger, how he means to load His tongue with the filll weight of utterless thought, With thunder, and with music, and with pomp: Such noise is like the roar of bleak-grown pines; Which, when it ceases in this mountain'd world, No other sound succeeds; but ceasing here, Among these fallen, Saturn's voice therefrom Grew up like organ, that begins anew Its strain, when other harmonies, stopt short, Leave the dinn'd air vibrating silverly. Thus grew it up-"Not in my own sad breast, Which is its own great judge and searcher out, Can I find reason why ye should be thus: Not in the legends of the first of days, Studied from that old spirit-leaved book Which starry Uranus with finger bright Sav'd from the shores of darkness, when the waves Low-ebb'd still hid it up in shallow gloom;- And the which book ye know I ever kept For my firm-based footstool:-Ah, infirm! Not there, nor in sign, symbol, or portent Of element, earth, water, air, and fire,- At war, at peace, or inter-quarreling One against one, or two, or three, or all Each several one against the other three, As fire with air loud warring when rain-floods Drown both, and press them both against earth's face, Where, finding sulphur, a quadruple wrath Unhinges the poor world;-not in that strife, Wherefrom I take strange lore, and read it deep, Can I find reason why ye should be thus: No, nowhere can unriddle, though I search, And pore on Nature's universal scroll Even to swooning, why ye, Divinities, The first-born of all shap'd and palpable Gods, Should cower beneath what, in comparison, Is untremendous might. Yet ye are here, O'erwhelm'd, and spurn'd, and batter'd, ye are here! O Titans, shall I say 'Arise!'-Ye groan: Shall I say 'Crouch!'-Ye groan. What can I then? O Heaven wide! O unseen parent dear! What can I? Tell me, all ye brethren Gods, How we can war, how engine our great wrath! O speak your counsel now, for Saturn's ear Is all a-hunger'd. Thou, Oceanus, Ponderest high and deep; and in thy face I see, astonied, that severe content Which comes of thought and musing: give us help!"   So ended Saturn; and the God of the sea, Sophist and sage, from no Athenian grove, But cogitation in his watery shades, Arose, with locks not oozy, and began, In murmurs, which his first-endeavouring tongue Caught infant-like from the far-foamed sands. "O ye, whom wrath consumes! who, passion-stung, Writhe at defeat, and nurse your agonies! Shut up your senses, stifle up your ears, My voice is not a bellows unto ire. Yet listen, ye who will, whilst I bring proof How ye, perforce, must be content to stoop: And in the proof much comfort will I give, If ye will take that comfort in its truth. We fall by course of Nature's law, not force Of thunder, or of Jove. Great Saturn, thou Hast sifted well the atom-universe; But for this reason, that thou art the King, And only blind from sheer supremacy, One avenue was shaded from thine eyes, Through which I wandered to eternal truth. And first, as thou wast not the first of powers, So art thou not the last; it cannot be: Thou art not the beginning nor the end. From Chaos and parental Darkness came Light, the first fruits of that intestine broil, That sullen ferment, which for wondrous ends Was ripening in itself. The ripe hour came, And with it Light, and Light, engendering Upon its own producer, forthwith touch'd The whole enormous matter into life. Upon that very hour, our parentage, The Heavens and the Earth, were manifest: Then thou first born, and we the giant race, Found ourselves ruling new and beauteous realms. Now comes the pain of truth, to whom 'tis pain; O folly! for to bear all naked truths, And to envisage circumstance, all calm, That is the top of sovereignty. Mark well! As Heaven and Earth are fairer, fairer far Than Chaos and blank Darkness, though once chiefs; And as we show beyond that Heaven and Earth In form and shape compact and beautiful, In will, in action free, companionship, And thousand other signs of purer life; So on our heels a fresh perfection treads, A power more strong in beauty, born of us And fated to excel us, as we pass In glory that old Darkness: nor are we Thereby more conquer'd, than by us the rule Of shapeless Chaos. Say, doth the dull soil Quarrel with the proud forests it hath fed, And feedeth still, more comely than itself? Can it deny the chiefdom of green groves? Or shall the tree be envious of the dove Because it cooeth, and hath snowy wings To wander wherewithal and find its joys? We are such forest-trees, and our fair boughs Have bred forth, not pale solitary doves, But eagles golden-feather'd, who do tower Above us in their beauty, and must reign In right thereof; for 'tis the eternal law That first in beauty should be first in might: Yea, by that law, another race may drive Our conquerors to mourn as we do now. Have ye beheld the young God of the seas, My dispossessor? Have ye seen his face? Have ye beheld his chariot, foam'd along By noble winged creatures he hath made? I saw him on the calmed waters scud, With such a glow of beauty in his eyes, That it enforc'd me to bid sad farewell To all my empire: farewell sad I took, And hither came, to see how dolorous fate Had wrought upon ye; and how I might best Give consolation in this woe extreme. Receive the truth, and let it be your balm."   Whether through pos'd conviction, or disdain, They guarded silence, when Oceanus Left murmuring, what deepest thought can tell? But so it was, none answer'd for a space, Save one whom none regarded, Clymene; And yet she answer'd not, only complain'd, With hectic lips, and eyes up-looking mild, Thus wording timidly among the fierce: "O Father! I am here the simplest voice, And all my knowledge is that joy is gone, And this thing woe crept in among our hearts, There to remain for ever, as I fear: I would not bode of evil, if I thought So weak a creature could turn off the help Which by just right should come of mighty Gods; Yet let me tell my sorrow, let me tell Of what I heard, and how it made me weep, And know that we had parted from all hope. I stood upon a shore, a pleasant shore, Where a sweet clime was breathed from a land Of fragrance, quietness, and trees, and flowers. Full of calm joy it was, as I of grief; Too full of joy and soft delicious warmth; So that I felt a movement in my heart To chide, and to reproach that solitude With songs of misery, music of our woes; And sat me down, and took a mouthed shell And murmur'd into it, and made melody- O melody no more! for while I sang, And with poor skill let pass into the breeze The dull shell's echo, from a bowery strand Just opposite, an island of the sea, There came enchantment with the shifting wind, That did both drown and keep alive my ears. I threw my shell away upon the sand, And a wave fill'd it, as my sense was fill'd With that new blissful golden melody. A living death was in each gush of sounds, Each family of rapturous hurried notes, That fell, one after one, yet all at once, Like pearl beads dropping sudden from their string: And then another, then another strain, Each like a dove leaving its olive perch, With music wing'd instead of silent plumes, To hover round my head, and make me sick Of joy and grief at once. Grief overcame, And I was stopping up my frantic ears, When, past all hindrance of my trembling hands, A voice came sweeter, sweeter than all tune, And still it cried, 'Apollo! young Apollo! The morning-bright Apollo! young Apollo!' I fled, it follow'd me, and cried 'Apollo!' O Father, and O Brethren, had ye felt Those pains of mine; O Saturn, hadst thou felt, Ye would not call this too indulged tongue Presumptuous, in thus venturing to be heard."   So far her voice flow'd on, like timorous brook That, lingering along a pebbled coast, Doth fear to meet the sea: but sea it met, And shudder'd; for the overwhelming voice Of huge Enceladus swallow'd it in wrath: The ponderous syllables, like sullen waves In the half-glutted hollows of reef-rocks, Came booming thus, while still upon his arm He lean'd; not rising, from supreme contempt. "Or shall we listen to the over-wise, Or to the over-foolish, Giant-Gods? Not thunderbolt on thunderbolt, till all That rebel Jove's whole armoury were spent, Not world on world upon these shoulders piled, Could agonize me more than baby-words In midst of this dethronement horrible. Speak! roar! shout! yell! ye sleepy Titans all. Do ye forget the blows, the buffets vile? Are ye not smitten by a youngling arm? Dost thou forget, sham Monarch of the waves, Thy scalding in the seas? What! have I rous'd Your spleens with so few simple words as these? O joy! for now I see ye are not lost: O joy! for now I see a thousand eyes Wide-glaring for revenge!"-As this he said, He lifted up his stature vast, and stood, Still without intermission speaking thus: "Now ye are flames, I'll tell you how to burn, And purge the ether of our enemies; How to feed fierce the crooked stings of fire, And singe away the swollen clouds of Jove, Stifling that puny essence in its tent. O let him feel the evil he hath done; For though I scorn Oceanus's lore, Much pain have I for more than loss of realms: The days of peace and slumbrous calm are fled; Those days, all innocent of scathing war, When all the fair Existences of heaven Carne open-eyed to guess what we would speak:- That was before our brows were taught to frown, Before our lips knew else but solemn sounds; That was before we knew the winged thing, Victory, might be lost, or might be won. And be ye mindful that Hyperion, Our brightest brother, still is undisgraced- Hyperion, lo! his radiance is here!"   All eyes were on Enceladus's face, And they beheld, while still Hyperion's name Flew from his lips up to the vaulted rocks, A pallid gleam across his features stern: Not savage, for he saw full many a God Wroth as himself. He look'd upon them all, And in each face he saw a gleam of light, But splendider in Saturn's, whose hoar locks Shone like the bubbling foam about a keel When the prow sweeps into a midnight cove. In pale and silver silence they remain'd, Till suddenly a splendor, like the morn, Pervaded all the beetling gloomy steeps, All the sad spaces of oblivion, And every gulf, and every chasm old, And every height, and every sullen depth, Voiceless, or hoarse with loud tormented streams: And all the everlasting cataracts, And all the headlong torrents far and near, Mantled before in darkness and huge shade, Now saw the light and made it terrible. It was Hyperion:-a granite peak His bright feet touch'd, and there he stay'd to view The misery his brilliance had betray'd To the most hateful seeing of itself. Golden his hair of short Numidian curl, Regal his shape majestic, a vast shade In midst of his own brightness, like the bulk Of Memnon's image at the set of sun To one who travels from the dusking East: Sighs, too, as mournful as that Memnon's harp He utter'd, while his hands contemplative He press'd together, and in silence stood. Despondence seiz'd again the fallen Gods At sight of the dejected King of day, And many hid their faces from the light: But fierce Enceladus sent forth his eyes Among the brotherhood; and, at their glare, Uprose Iapetus, and Creus too, And Phorcus, sea-born, and together strode To where he towered on his eminence. There those four shouted forth old Saturn's name; Hyperion from the peak loud answered, "Saturn!" Saturn sat near the Mother of the Gods, In whose face was no joy, though all the Gods Gave from their hollow throats the name of "Saturn!" by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes ~ John Keats, Hyperion. Book II

53:Deep in the shady sadness of a vale Far sunken from the healthy breath of morn, Far from the fiery noon, and eve's one star, Sat gray-hair'd Saturn, quiet as a stone, Still as the silence round about his lair; Forest on forest hung about his head Like cloud on cloud. No stir of air was there, Not so much life as on a summer's day Robs not one light seed from the feather'd grass, But where the dead leaf fell, there did it rest. A stream went voiceless by, still deadened more By reason of his fallen divinity Spreading a shade: the Naiad 'mid her reeds Press'd her cold finger closer to her lips.   Along the margin-sand large foot-marks went, No further than to where his feet had stray'd, And slept there since. Upon the sodden ground His old right hand lay nerveless, listless, dead, Unsceptred; and his realmless eyes were closed; While his bow'd head seem'd list'ning to the Earth, His ancient mother, for some comfort yet.   It seem'd no force could wake him from his place; But there came one, who with a kindred hand Touch'd his wide shoulders, after bending low With reverence, though to one who knew it not. She was a Goddess of the infant world; By her in stature the tall Amazon Had stood a pigmy's height: she would have ta'en Achilles by the hair and bent his neck; Or with a finger stay'd Ixion's wheel. Her face was large as that of Memphian sphinx, Pedestal'd haply in a palace court, When sages look'd to Egypt for their lore. But oh! how unlike marble was that face: How beautiful, if sorrow had not made Sorrow more beautiful than Beauty's self. There was a listening fear in her regard, As if calamity had but begun; As if the vanward clouds of evil days Had spent their malice, and the sullen rear Was with its stored thunder labouring up. One hand she press'd upon that aching spot Where beats the human heart, as if just there, Though an immortal, she felt cruel pain: The other upon Saturn's bended neck She laid, and to the level of his ear Leaning with parted lips, some words she spake In solemn tenor and deep organ tone: Some mourning words, which in our feeble tongue Would come in these like accents; O how frail To that large utterance of the early Gods! "Saturn, look up!-though wherefore, poor old King? I have no comfort for thee, no not one: I cannot say, 'O wherefore sleepest thou?' For heaven is parted from thee, and the earth Knows thee not, thus afflicted, for a God; And ocean too, with all its solemn noise, Has from thy sceptre pass'd; and all the air Is emptied of thine hoary majesty. Thy thunder, conscious of the new command, Rumbles reluctant o'er our fallen house; And thy sharp lightning in unpractised hands Scorches and burns our once serene domain. O aching time! O moments big as years! All as ye pass swell out the monstrous truth, And press it so upon our weary griefs That unbelief has not a space to breathe. Saturn, sleep on:-O thoughtless, why did I Thus violate thy slumbrous solitude? Why should I ope thy melancholy eyes? Saturn, sleep on! while at thy feet I weep."   As when, upon a tranced summer-night, Those green-rob'd senators of mighty woods, Tall oaks, branch-charmed by the earnest stars, Dream, and so dream all night without a stir, Save from one gradual solitary gust Which comes upon the silence, and dies off, As if the ebbing air had but one wave; So came these words and went; the while in tears She touch'd her fair large forehead to the ground, Just where her fallen hair might be outspread A soft and silken mat for Saturn's feet. One moon, with alteration slow, had shed Her silver seasons four upon the night, And still these two were postured motionless, Like natural sculpture in cathedral cavern; The frozen God still couchant on the earth, And the sad Goddess weeping at his feet: Until at length old Saturn lifted up His faded eyes, and saw his kingdom gone, And all the gloom and sorrow ofthe place, And that fair kneeling Goddess; and then spake, As with a palsied tongue, and while his beard Shook horrid with such aspen-malady: "O tender spouse of gold Hyperion, Thea, I feel thee ere I see thy face; Look up, and let me see our doom in it; Look up, and tell me if this feeble shape Is Saturn's; tell me, if thou hear'st the voice Of Saturn; tell me, if this wrinkling brow, Naked and bare of its great diadem, Peers like the front of Saturn? Who had power To make me desolate? Whence came the strength? How was it nurtur'd to such bursting forth, While Fate seem'd strangled in my nervous grasp? But it is so; and I am smother'd up, And buried from all godlike exercise Of influence benign on planets pale, Of admonitions to the winds and seas, Of peaceful sway above man's harvesting, And all those acts which Deity supreme Doth ease its heart of love in.-I am gone Away from my own bosom: I have left My strong identity, my real self, Somewhere between the throne, and where I sit Here on this spot of earth. Search, Thea, search! Open thine eyes eterne, and sphere them round Upon all space: space starr'd, and lorn of light; Space region'd with life-air; and barren void; Spaces of fire, and all the yawn of hell.- Search, Thea, search! and tell me, if thou seest A certain shape or shadow, making way With wings or chariot fierce to repossess A heaven he lost erewhile: it must-it must Be of ripe progress-Saturn must be King. Yes, there must be a golden victory; There must be Gods thrown down, and trumpets blown Of triumph calm, and hymns of festival Upon the gold clouds metropolitan, Voices of soft proclaim, and silver stir Of strings in hollow shells; and there shall be Beautiful things made new, for the surprise Of the sky-children; I will give command: Thea! Thea! Thea! where is Saturn?" This passion lifted him upon his feet, And made his hands to struggle in the air, His Druid locks to shake and ooze with sweat, His eyes to fever out, his voice to cease. He stood, and heard not Thea's sobbing deep; A little time, and then again he snatch'd Utterance thus.-"But cannot I create? Cannot I form? Cannot I fashion forth Another world, another universe, To overbear and crumble this to nought? Where is another Chaos? Where?"-That word Found way unto Olympus, and made quake The rebel three.-Thea was startled up, And in her bearing was a sort of hope, As thus she quick-voic'd spake, yet full of awe.   "This cheers our fallen house: come to our friends, O Saturn! come away, and give them heart; I know the covert, for thence came I hither." Thus brief; then with beseeching eyes she went With backward footing through the shade a space: He follow'd, and she turn'd to lead the way Through aged boughs, that yielded like the mist Which eagles cleave upmounting from their nest.   Meanwhile in other realms big tears were shed, More sorrow like to this, and such like woe, Too huge for mortal tongue or pen of scribe: The Titans fierce, self-hid, or prison-bound, Groan'd for the old allegiance once more, And listen'd in sharp pain for Saturn's voice. But one of the whole mammoth-brood still kept His sov'reigny, and rule, and majesy;- Blazing Hyperion on his orbed fire Still sat, still snuff'd the incense, teeming up From man to the sun's God: yet unsecure: For as among us mortals omens drear Fright and perplex, so also shuddered he- Not at dog's howl, or gloom-bird's hated screech, Or the familiar visiting of one Upon the first toll of his passing-bell, Or prophesyings of the midnight lamp; But horrors, portion'd to a giant nerve, Oft made Hyperion ache. His palace bright, Bastion'd with pyramids of glowing gold, And touch'd with shade of bronzed obelisks, Glar'd a blood-red through all its thousand courts, Arches, and domes, and fiery galleries; And all its curtains of Aurorian clouds Flush'd angerly: while sometimes eagles' wings, Unseen before by Gods or wondering men, Darken'd the place; and neighing steeds were heard Not heard before by Gods or wondering men. Also, when he would taste the spicy wreaths Of incense, breath'd aloft from sacred hills, Instead of sweets, his ample palate took Savor of poisonous brass and metal sick: And so, when harbor'd in the sleepy west, After the full completion of fair day,- For rest divine upon exalted couch, And slumber in the arms of melody, He pac'd away the pleasant hours of ease With stride colossal, on from hall to hall; While far within each aisle and deep recess, His winged minions in close clusters stood, Amaz'd and full offear; like anxious men Who on wide plains gather in panting troops, When earthquakes jar their battlements and towers. Even now, while Saturn, rous'd from icy trance, Went step for step with Thea through the woods, Hyperion, leaving twilight in the rear, Came slope upon the threshold of the west; Then, as was wont, his palace-door flew ope In smoothest silence, save what solemn tubes, Blown by the serious Zephyrs, gave of sweet And wandering sounds, slow-breathed melodies; And like a rose in vermeil tint and shape, In fragrance soft, and coolness to the eye, That inlet to severe magnificence Stood full blown, for the God to enter in.   He enter'd, but he enter'd full of wrath; His flaming robes stream'd out beyond his heels, And gave a roar, as if of earthly fire, That scar'd away the meek ethereal Hours And made their dove-wings tremble. On he flared From stately nave to nave, from vault to vault, Through bowers of fragrant and enwreathed light, And diamond-paved lustrous long arcades, Until he reach'd the great main cupola; There standing fierce beneath, he stampt his foot, And from the basements deep to the high towers Jarr'd his own golden region; and before The quavering thunder thereupon had ceas'd, His voice leapt out, despite of godlike curb, To this result: "O dreams of day and night! O monstrous forms! O effigies of pain! O spectres busy in a cold, cold gloom! O lank-eared phantoms of black-weeded pools! Why do I know ye? why have I seen ye? why Is my eternal essence thus distraught To see and to behold these horrors new? Saturn is fallen, am I too to fall? Am I to leave this haven of my rest, This cradle of my glory, this soft clime, This calm luxuriance of blissful light, These crystalline pavilions, and pure fanes, Of all my lucent empire? It is left Deserted, void, nor any haunt of mine. The blaze, the splendor, and the symmetry, I cannot see but darkness, death, and darkness. Even here, into my centre of repose, The shady visions come to domineer, Insult, and blind, and stifle up my pomp.- Fall!-No, by Tellus and her briny robes! Over the fiery frontier of my realms I will advance a terrible right arm Shall scare that infant thunderer, rebel Jove, And bid old Saturn take his throne again."- He spake, and ceas'd, the while a heavier threat Held struggle with his throat but came not forth; For as in theatres of crowded men Hubbub increases more they call out "Hush!" So at Hyperion's words the phantoms pale Bestirr'd themselves, thrice horrible and cold; And from the mirror'd level where he stood A mist arose, as from a scummy marsh. At this, through all his bulk an agony Crept gradual, from the feet unto the crown, Like a lithe serpent vast and muscular Making slow way, with head and neck convuls'd From over-strained might. Releas'd, he fled To the eastern gates, and full six dewy hours Before the dawn in season due should blush, He breath'd fierce breath against the sleepy portals, Clear'd them of heavy vapours, burst them wide Suddenly on the ocean's chilly streams. The planet orb of fire, whereon he rode Each day from east to west the heavens through, Spun round in sable curtaining of clouds; Not therefore veiled quite, blindfold, and hid, But ever and anon the glancing spheres, Circles, and arcs, and broad-belting colure, Glow'd through, and wrought upon the muffling dark Sweet-shaped lightnings from the nadir deep Up to the zenith,-hieroglyphics old, Which sages and keen-eyed astrologers Then living on the earth, with laboring thought Won from the gaze of many centuries: Now lost, save what we find on remnants huge Of stone, or rnarble swart; their import gone, Their wisdom long since fled.-Two wings this orb Possess'd for glory, two fair argent wings, Ever exalted at the God's approach: And now, from forth the gloom their plumes immense Rose, one by one, till all outspreaded were; While still the dazzling globe maintain'd eclipse, Awaiting for Hyperion's command. Fain would he have commanded, fain took throne And bid the day begin, if but for change. He might not:-No, though a primeval God: The sacred seasons might not be disturb'd. Therefore the operations of the dawn Stay'd in their birth, even as here 'tis told. Those silver wings expanded sisterly, Eager to sail their orb; the porches wide Open'd upon the dusk demesnes of night And the bright Titan, phrenzied with new woes, Unus'd to bend, by hard compulsion bent His spirit to the sorrow of the time; And all along a dismal rack of clouds, Upon the boundaries of day and night, He stretch'd himself in grief and radiance faint. There as he lay, the Heaven with its stars Look'd down on him with pity, and the voice Of Coelus, from the universal space, Thus whisper'd low and solemn in his ear: "O brightest of my children dear, earth-born And sky-engendered, son of mysteries All unrevealed even to the powers Which met at thy creating; at whose joys And palpitations sweet, and pleasures soft, I, Coelus, wonder, how they came and whence; And at the fruits thereof what shapes they be, Distinct, and visible; symbols divine, Manifestations of that beauteous life Diffus'd unseen throughout eternal space: Of these new-form'd art thou, O brightest child! Of these, thy brethren and the Goddesses! There is sad feud among ye, and rebellion Of son against his sire. I saw him fall, I saw my first-born tumbled from his throne! To me his arms were spread, to me his voice Found way from forth the thunders round his head! Pale wox I, and in vapours hid my face. Art thou, too, near such doom? vague fear there is: For I have seen my sons most unlike Gods. Divine ye were created, and divine In sad demeanour, solemn, undisturb'd, Unruffled, like high Gods, ye liv'd and ruled: Now I behold in you fear, hope, and wrath; Actions of rage and passion; even as I see them, on the mortal world beneath, In men who die.-This is the grief, O son! Sad sign of ruin, sudden dismay, and fall! Yet do thou strive; as thou art capable, As thou canst move about, an evident God; And canst oppose to each malignant hour Ethereal presence:-I am but a voice; My life is but the life of winds and tides, No more than winds and tides can I avail:- But thou canst.-Be thou therefore in the van Of circumstance; yea, seize the arrow's barb Before the tense string murmur.-To the earth! For there thou wilt find Saturn, and his woes. Meantime I will keep watch on thy bright sun, And of thy seasons be a careful nurse."- Ere half this region-whisper had come down, Hyperion arose, and on the stars Lifted his curved lids, and kept them wide Until it ceas'd; and still he kept them wide: And still they were the same bright, patient stars. Then with a slow incline of his broad breast, Like to a diver in the pearly seas, Forward he stoop'd over the airy shore, And plung'd all noiseless into the deep night. 'Lord Houghton records, on the authority of Brown, that "Hyperion" was begun after the death of Tom Keats, when the poet took up his residence at Wentworth Place. (line 14): It seems to me that the power of realization shown in the first decade, and indeed throughout the fragment, answers all objections to the subject, and is the most absolute security for the nobility of the result which Keats would have achieved had he finished the poem. It is impossible to over-estimate the value of such a landscape, so touched in with a few strokes of titanic meaning and completeness; and the whole sentiment of gigantic despair reflected around the fallen god of the Titan dynasty, and permeating the landscape, is resumed in the most perfect manner in the incident of the motionless fallen leaf, a line almost as intense and full of the essence of poetry as any line in our language. It were ungracious to take exception to the poor Naiad; but she has not the convincing appropriateness of the rest of this sublime opening.' (line 51): Leigh Hunt's remarks upon Keats's failure to finish the poem are specially appropriate to this passage, "If any living poet could finish this fragment, we believe it is the author himself. But perhaps he feels that he ought not. A story which involves passion, almost of necessity involves speech; and though we may well enough describe beings greater than ourselves by comparison, unfortunately we cannot make them speak by comparison." ~ Poetical Works of John Keats, ed. H. Buxton Forman, Crowell publ. 1895. by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes ~ John Keats, Hyperion. Book I

54:Muiopotmos, Or The Fate Of The Butterflie I SING of deadly dolorous debate, Stir'd vp through wrathfull Nemesis despight, Betwixt two mightie ones of great estate, Drawne into armes, and proofe of mortall fight, Through prowd ambition, and hartswelling hate, Whilest neither could the others greater might And sdeignfull scorne endure; that from small iarre Their wraths at length broke into open warre. The rote whereof and tragicall effect, Vouchsafe, O thou the mournfulst Muse of nyne, That wontst the tragick stage for to direct, In funerall complaints and waylfull tyne, Reueale to me, and all the meanes detect, Through which sad Clarion did at last declyne To lowest wretchednes; And is there then Such rancor in the harts of mightie men? Of all the race of siluer-winged Flies Which doo possesse the Empire of the aire, Betwixt the centred earth, and azure skies, Was none more fauourable, nor more faire, Whilst heauen did fauour his felicities, Then Clarion, the eldest sonne and haire Of Muscaroll, and in his fathers sight Of all aliue did seeme the fairest wight. With fruitfull hope his aged breast he fed Of future good, which his young toward yeares, Full of braue courage and bold hardyhed, Aboue th' ensample of his equall peares, Did largely promise, and to him forered, (Whilst oft his heart did melt in tender teares) That he in time would sure proue such an one, As should be worthie of his fathers throne. The fresh young flie, in whom the kindly fire Of lustfull yong[th] began to kindle fast, Did much disdaine to subject his desire 116 To loathsome sloth, or houres in ease to wast, But ioy'd to range abroad in fresh attire; Through the wide compas of the ayrie coast, And with vnwearied wings each part t'inquire Of the wide rule of his renowmed sire. For he so swift and nimble was of flight, That from this lower tract he dar'd to stie Vp to the clowdes, and thence with pineons light, To mount aloft vnto the Christall skie, To vew the workmanship of heauens hight: Whence downe descending he along would flie Vpon the streaming riuers, sport to finde; And oft would dare to tempt the troublous winde. So on a Summers day, when season milde With gentle calme the world had quieted, And high in heauen Hyperionsfierie childe Ascending, did his beames abroad dispred, Whiles all the heauens on lower creatures smilde; Yong Clarion with vaunted lustie head, After his guize did cast abroad to fare; And theretoo gan his furnitures prepare. His breastplate first, that was of substance pure, Before his noble heart he firmely bound, That mought his life from yron death assure, And ward his gentle corpes from cruell wound: For it by arte was framed to endure The bit of balefull steele and bitter stownd, No lesse then that, which Vulcane made to sheild Achilles life from fate of Troyan field. And then about his shoulders broad he threw An hairie hide of some wild beast, whom hee In saluage forrest by aduenture slew, And rest the spoyle his ornament to bee: Which spredding all his backe with dreadfull vew, Made all that him so horrible did see, Thinke him Alcides with the Lyons skin, When the Næmean Conquest he did win. Vpon his head his glistering Burganet, 117 The which was wrought by wonderous deuice, And curiously engrauen, he did set: The mettall was of rare and passing price; Not Bilbo steele, nor brasse from Corinth fet, Nor costly Oricalche from strange Phoenice; But such as could both Phoebus arrowes ward, And th' hayling darts of heauen beating hard. Therein two deadly weapons fixt he bore, Strongly outlaunced towards either side, Like two sharpe speares, his enemies to gore: Like as a warlike Brigandine, applyde To fight, layes forth her threatfull pikes afore, The engines which in them sad death doo hyde: So did this flie outstretch his fearefull hornes, Yet so as him their terrour more adornes. Lastly his shinie wings as siluer bright, Painted with thousand colours, passing farre All Painters skill, he did about him dight: Not halfe so manie sundrie colours arre In Iris bowe, ne heauen doth shine so bright, Distinguished with manie a twinckling starre, Nor Iunoes Bird in her ey-spotted traine So many goodly colours doth containe. Ne (may it be withouten perill spoken) The Archer God, the son of Cytheree, That ioyes on wretched louers to be wroken, And heaped spoyles of bleeding harts to see, Beares in his wings so manie a changefull token. Ah my liege Lord, forgiue it vnto mee, If ought against thine honour I haue tolde; Yet sure those wings were fairer manifolde. Full manie a Ladie faire, in Court full oft Beholding them, him secretly enuide, And wisht that two such fannes, so silken soft, And golden faire, her Loue would her prouide; Or that when them the gorgeous Flie had doft,0 Some one that would with grace be gratifide, From him would steale them priuily away, 118 And bring to her so precious a pray. Report is that dame Venus on a day In spring when flowres doo clothe the fruitfull ground, Walking abroad with all her Nymphes to play, Bad her faire damzels flocking her arownd, To gather flowres, her forhead to array: Emongst the rest a gentle Nymph was found, Hight Astery, excelling all the crewe In curteous vsage, and vnstained hewe Who beeing nimbler ioynted than the rest, And more industrious, gathered more store Of the fields honour, than the others best; Which they in secret harts enuying sore, Tolde Venus, when her as the worthiest She praisd, that Cupide (as they heard before) Did lend her secret aide, in gathering Into her lap the children of the spring. Wherof the Goddesse gathering iealous feare, Not yet vnmindfull how not long agoe Her sonne to Psyche secrete loue did beare, And long it close conceal'd, till mickle woe Thereof arose, and manie a rufull teare; Reason with sudden rage did ouergoe, And giuing hastie credit to th'accuser, Was led away of them that did abuse her. Eftsoones that Damzell by her heauenly might, She turn'd into a winged Butterflie, In the wide aire to make her wandring flight; And all those flowres, with which so plenteouslie Her lap she filled had, that bred her spright, She placed in her wings, for memorie Of her pretended crime, though crime none were: Since which that flie them in her wings doth beare. Thus the fresh Clarion being readie dight, Vnto his iourney did himselfe addresse, And with good speed began to take his flight: Ouer the fields in his franke lustinesse, 119 And all the countrey wide he did possesse, Feeding vpon their pleasures bounteouslie, That none gainsaid, nor none him did enuie. The woods, the riuers, and the meadowes green, With his aire-cutting wings he measur'd wide, Ne did he leaue the mountaines bare vnseene, Nor the ranke grassie fennes delights vntride. But none of these, how euer sweete they beene, Mote please his fancie, nor him cause t'abide: His choicefull sense with euerie change doth flit. No common things may please a wauering wit. To the gay gardins his vnstaid desire Him wholly caried, to refresh his sprights: There lauish Nature in her best attire, Powres forth sweete odors, and alluring sights; And Arte with her contending, doth aspire T'excell the naturall, with made delights: And all that faire or pleasant may be found, In riotous excesse doth there abound. There he arriuing, round about doth flie, From bed to bed, from one to other border, And takes suruey with curious busie eye, Of euerie flowre and herbe there set in order; Now this, now that he tasteth tenderly, Yet none of them he rudely doth disorder, Ne with his feete their silken leaues deface; But pastures on the pleasures of each place. And euermore with most varietie, And change of sweetnesse (for all change is sweete) He casts his glutton sense to satisfie, Now sucking of the sap of herbe most meete, Or of the deaw, which yet on them does lie, Now in the same bathing his tender feete: And then he pearcheth on some braunch thereby, To weather him, and his moyst wings to dry. And then againe he turneth to his play, To spoyle the pleasure of that Paradise: The wholsome Saluge, and Lauender still gray, 120 Ranke smelling Rue, and Cummin good for eyes, The Roses raigning in the pride of May, Sharpe Isope, good for greene wounds remedies, Faire Marigoldes, and Bees alluring Thime, Sweet Marioram, and Daysies decking prime. Coole Violets, and Orpine growing still, Embathed Balme, and chearfull Galingale, Fresh Costmarie, and breathfull Camomill, Red Poppie, and drink-quickning Setuale, Veyne-healing Veruen, and hed-purging Dill, Sound Sauorie, and Bazil hartie-hale, Fat Colworts and comforting Perseline,0 Colde Lettuce, and refreshing Rosmarine. And whatso else of virtue good or ill Grewe in the Gardin, fetcht from farre away, Of euerie one he takes, and tastes at will, And on their pleasures greedily doth pray. Then when he hath both plaid, and fed his fill, In the warme Sunne he doth himselfe embay, And there him rests in riotous siffisaunce Of all his gladfulnes, and kingly ioyaunce. What more felicitie can fall to creature Than to enioy delight with libertie, And to be Lord of all the workes of Nature, To raine in th' aire from th' earth to highest skie, To feed on flowres, and weeds of glorious feature, To take what euer thing doth please the eie? Who rests not pleased with such happines, Well worthie he to taste of wretchednes. But what on earth can long abide in state? Or who can him assure of happie day; Sith morning faire may bring fowle euening late, And least mishap the most blisse alter may? For thousand perills lie in close awaite About vs daylie, to worke our decay; That none, except a God, or God him guide, May them auoyde, or remedie prouide. And whatso heauens in their secrete doome 121 Ordained haue, how can fraile fleshly wight Forecast, but it must needs to issue come? The sea, the aire, the fire, the day, the night, And th' armies of their creatures all and some Do serue to them, and with importune might Warre against vs the vassals of their will. Who then can saue, what they dispose to spill? Not thou, O Clarion, though fairest thou Of all thy kinde, vnhappie happie Flie, Whose cruell fate is wouen euen now Of Ioues owne hand, to worke thy miserie: Ne may thee helpe the manie hartie vow, Which thy olde Sire with sacred pietie Hath powred forth for thee, and th' altars sprent: Nought may thee saue from heauens auengement. It fortuned (as heauens had behight) That in this gardin, where yong Clarion Was wont to solace him, a wicked wight, The foe of faire things, th' author of confusion, The shame of Nature, the bondslaue of spight, Had lately built his hatefull mansion; And, lurking closely, in awayte now lay How he might anie in his trap betray. But when he spide the ioyous Butterflie In this faire plot displacing too and fro, Fearles of foes and hidden ieopardie, Lord how he gan for to bestirre him tho, And to his wicked worke each part applie: His heate did earne against his hated foe, And bowels so with ranckling poyson swelde, That scarce the skin the strong contagion helde. The cause why he this Flie so maliced, Was (as in stories it is written found) For that his mother which him bore and bred, The most fine-fingred workwoman on ground, Arachne, by his meanes was vanquished Of Pallas, and in her owne skill confound, When she with her for excellence contended, 122 That wrought her shame, and sorrow neuer ended. For the Tritonian goddesse, hauing hard Her blazed fame, which all the world had fil'd, Came downe to proue the truth, and due reward For her prais-worthie workmanship to yeild But the presumptuous Damzel rashly dar'd The Goddesse selfe to chalenge to the field, And to compare with her in curious skill Of workes with loome, with needle, and with quill. Minerua did the chalenge not refuse, But deign'd with her the paragon to make: So to their worke they sit, and each doth chuse What storie she will for her tapet take. Arachne figur'd how Ioue did abuse Europa like a Bull, and on his backe Her through the sea did beare; so liuely seene, That it true Sea, and true Bull ye would weene. Shee seem'd still backe vnto the land to looke, And her play-fellowes aide to call, and feare The dashing of the waues, that vp she tooke Her daintie feete, and garments gathered neare: But (Lord) how she in euerie member shooke, When as the land she saw no more appeare, But a wilde wildernes of waters deepe: Then gan she greatly to lament and weepe. Before the Bull she pictur'd winged Loue, With his yong brother Sport, light fluttering Vpon the waues, as each had beene a Doue; The one his bowe and shafts, the other Spring. A burning Teade about his head did moue, As in their Syres new loue both triumphing: And manie Nymphes about them flocking round, And manie Tritons, which did their hornes sound. And round about, her worke she did empale With a faire border wrought of sundrie flowres, Enwouen with an Yuie winding trayle:0 A goodly worke, full fit for Kingly bowres, 123 Such as Dame Pallas, such as Enuie pale, That al good things with venemous tooth deuowres, Could not accuse. Then gan the Goddesse bright Her selfe likewise vnto her worke to dight. She made the storie of the old debate Which she with Neptune did for Athens trie: Twelue Gods doo sit around in royall state, And Ioue in midst with awfull Maiestie, To iudge the strife betweene them stirred late: Each of the Gods by his like visnomie Eathe to be knowen; but Ioue aboue them all, By his great lookes and power Imperiall. Before them stands the God of Seas in place, Clayming that sea-coast Citie as his right, And strikes the rockes with his three-forked mace; Whenceforth issues a warlike steed in sight, The signe by which he chalengeth the place, That all the Gods, which saw his wondrous might Did surely deeme the victorie his due: But seldome seene, foriudgement proueth true. Then to her selfe she giues her Aegide shield, And steelhed speare, and morion on her hedd, Such as she oft is seene in warlicke field: Then sets she forth, how with her weapon dredd She smote the ground, the which streight foorth did yield A fruitfull Olyue tree, with berries spredd, That all the Gods admir'd; then all the storie She compast with a wreathe of Olyues hoarie. Emongst these leaues she made a Butterflie, With excellent deuice and wondrous flight, Fluttring among the Oliues wantonly, That seem'd to liue, so like it was in sight: The veluet nap which on his wings doth lie, The siken downe with which his backe is dight, His broad outstretched hornes, his [h]ayrie thies, His glorious colours, and his glittering eies. Which when Arachne saw, as ouerlaid 124 And mastered with workmanship so rare, She stood astonied long, ne ought gainesaid, And with fast fixed eyes on her did stare, And by her silence, signe of one dismaid, The victorie did yeeld her as her share: Yet she did inly fret, and felly burne, And all her blood to poysonous rancor turne: That shortly from the shape of womanhed, Such as she was, when Pallas she attempted , She grew to hideous shape of dryrihed, Pined with griefe of folly late repented: Eftsoones her white streight legs were altered To crooked crawling shankes, of marrowe empted, And her faire face to fowle and loathsome hewe And her fine corpses to a bag of venim grewe. This cursed creature, mindfull of that olde Enfested grudge, the which his mother felt, So soone as Clarion he did beholde, His heart with vengefull malice inly swelt; And weauing straight a net with manie a folde About the caue, in which he lurking dwelt, With fine small cords about it stretched wide, So finely sponne, that scarce they could be spide. Not anie damzell, which her vaunteth most In skilfull knitting of soft silken twyne; Nor anie skil'd in workmanship embost; Nor anie skil'd in loupes of fingring fine, Might in their diuers cunning euer dare, With this so curious networke to compare. Ne doo I thinke, that that same subtil gin, The which the Lemnian God framde craftilie, Mars sleeping with his wife to compasse in, That all the Gods with common mockerie Might laugh at them, and scorne their shamefull sin, Was like to this. This same he did applie For to entrap the careles Clarion, That ran'gd each where without suspition. Suspition of friend, nor feare of foe, 125 That hazarded his health, had he at all, But walkt at will, and wandred too and fro, In the pride of his freedome principall: Litle wist he his fatall future woe, But was secure, the liker he to fall. He likest is to fall into mischaunce, That is regardles of his gouernaunce. Yet still Aragnoll (so his foe was hight) Lay lurking couertly him to surprise, And all his gins that him entangle might, Drest in good order as he could deuise. At length the foolish Flie without foresight, As he that did all danger quite despise, Toward those parts came flying careleslie , Where hidden was his hatefull enemie. Who, seeing him, with secrete ioy therefore Did tickle inwardly in euerie vaine, And his false hart fraught with all treasons store, Was fil'd with hope, his purpose to obtaine: Himselfe he close vpgathered more and more Into his den, that his deceiptfull traine By his there being might not be bewraid, Ne anie noyse, ne anie motion made. Like as a wily Foxe, that hauing spide, Where on a sunnie banke the Lambes doo play, Full closely creeping by the hinder side, Lyes in ambushment of his hoped pray, Ne stirreth limbe, till seeing readie tide, He rusheth forth, and snatcheth quite away One of the little yonglings vnawares: So to his worke Aragnoll him prepares. Who now shall giue vnto my heauie eyes A well of teares, that all may ouerflow? Or where shall I finde lamentable cryes, And mournfull tunes enough my griefe to show? Helpe O thou Tragick Muse, me to deuise Notes sad enough t'expresse this bitter throw: For loe, the drerie stownd is now arriued, 126 That of all happines hath vs depriued. The luckles Clarion, whether cruell Fate, Or wicked Fortune faultles him misled, Or some vngracious blast out of the gate Of Aeoles raine perforce him droue on hed, Was (O sad hap and howre vnfortunate) With violent swift flight forth caried Into the cursed cobweb, which his foe Had framed for his finall ouerthroe. There the fond Flie entangled, strugled long, Himselfe to free thereout; but all in vaine. For striuing more, the more in laces strong Himselfe he tide, and wrapt his winges twine In lymie snares the subtill loupes among; That in the ende he breathlesse did remaine, And all his yougthly forces idly spent, Him to the mercie of th' auenger lent. Which when the greisly tyrant did espie, Like a grimme Lyon rushing with fierce might Out of his den, he seized greedilie On the resistles pray, and with fell spight, Vnder the left wing stroke his weapon slie Into his heart, that his deepe groning spright In bloodie streames foorth fled into the aire, His bodie left the spectacle of care. ~ Edmund Spenser

55:CANTO I. Fanatics have their dreams, wherewith they weave A paradise for a sect; the savage, too, From forth the loftiest fashion of his sleep Guesses at heaven; pity these have not Trac'd upon vellum or wild Indian leaf The shadows of melodious utterance, But bare of laurel they live, dream, and die; For Poesy alone can tell her dreams,-- With the fine spell of words alone can save Imagination from the sable chain And dumb enchantment. Who alive can say, "Thou art no Poet -- may'st not tell thy dreams?" Since every man whose soul is not a clod Hath visions and would speak, if he had loved, And been well nurtured in his mother tongue. Whether the dream now purpos'd to rehearse Be poet's or fanatic's will be known When this warm scribe, my hand, is in the grave. Methought I stood where trees of every clime, Palm, myrtle, oak, and sycamore, and beech, With plantane and spice-blossoms, made a screen, In neighbourhood of fountains (by the noise Soft-showering in mine ears), and (by the touch Of scent) not far from roses. Twining round I saw an arbour with a drooping roof Of trellis vines, and bells, and larger blooms, Like floral censers, swinging light in air; Before its wreathed doorway, on a mound Of moss, was spread a feast of summer fruits, Which, nearer seen, seem'd refuse of a meal By angel tasted or our Mother Eve; For empty shells were scatter'd on the grass, And grapestalks but half-bare, and remnants more Sweet-smelling, whose pure kinds I could not know. Still was more plenty than the fabled horn Thrice emptied could pour forth at banqueting, For Prosperine return'd to her own fields, Where the white heifers low. And appetite, More yearning than on earth I ever felt, Growing within, I ate deliciously,-- And, after not long, thirsted; for thereby Stood a cool vessel of transparent juice Sipp'd by the wander'd bee, the which I took, And pledging all the mortals of the world, And all the dead whose names are in our lips, Drank. That full draught is parent of my theme. No Asian poppy nor elixir fine Of the soon-fading, jealous, Caliphat, No poison gender'd in close monkish cell, To thin the scarlet conclave of old men, Could so have rapt unwilling life away. Among the fragment husks and berries crush'd Upon the grass, I struggled hard against The domineering potion, but in vain. The cloudy swoon came on, and down I sank, Like a Silenus on an antique vase. How long I slumber'd 'tis a chance to guess. When sense of life return'd, I started up As if with wings, but the fair trees were gone, The mossy mound and arbour were no more; I look'd around upon the curved sides Of an old sanctuary, with roof august, Builded so high, it seem'd that filmed clouds Might spread beneath as o'er the stars of heaven. So old the place was, I remember'd none The like upon the earth: what I had seen Of grey cathedrals, buttress'd walls, rent towers, The superannuations of sunk realms, Or Nature's rocks toil'd hard in waves and winds, Seem'd but the faulture of decrepit things To that eternal domed monument. Upon the marble at my feet there lay Store of strange vessels and large draperies, Which needs have been of dyed asbestos wove, Or in that place the moth could not corrupt, So white the linen, so, in some, distinct Ran imageries from a sombre loom. All in a mingled heap confus'd there lay Robes, golden tongs, censer and chafing-dish, Girdles, and chains, and holy jewelries. Turning from these with awe, once more I raised My eyes to fathom the space every way: The embossed roof, the silent massy range Of columns north and south, ending in mist Of nothing; then to eastward, where black gates Were shut against the sunrise evermore; Then to the west I look'd, and saw far off An image, huge of feature as a cloud, At level of whose feet an altar slept, To be approach'd on either side by steps And marble balustrade, and patient travail To count with toil the innumerable degrees. Towards the altar sober-pac'd I went, Repressing haste as too unholy there; And, coming nearer, saw beside the shrine One ministering; and there arose a flame When in mid-day the sickening east-wind Shifts sudden to the south, the small warm rain Melts out of the frozen incense from all flowers, And fills the air with so much pleasant health That even the dying man forgets his shroud;-- Even so that lofty sacrificial fire, Sending forth Maian incense, spread around Forgetfulness of everything but bliss, And clouded all the altar with soft smoke; From whose white fragrant curtains thus I heard Language pronounc'd: "If thou canst not ascend These steps, die on that marble where thou art. Thy flesh, near cousin to the common dust, Will parch for lack of nutriment; thy bones Will wither in few years, and vanish so That not the quickest eye could find a grain Of what thou now art on that pavement cold. The sands of thy short life are spent this hour, And no hand in the universe can turn Thy hourglass, if these gummed leaves be burnt Ere thou canst mount up these immortal steps." I heard, I look'd: two senses both at once, So fine, so subtle, felt the tyranny Of that fierce threat and the hard task proposed. Prodigious seem'd the toil; the leaves were yet Burning, when suddenly a palsied chill Struck from the paved level up my limbs. And was ascending quick to put cold grasp Upon those streams that pulse beside the throat. I shriek'd, and the sharp anguish of my shriek Stung my own ears; I strove hard to escape The numbness, strove to gain the lowest step. Slow, heavy, deadly was my pace: the cold Grew stifling, suffocating at the heart; And when I clasp'd my hands I felt them not. One minute before death my ic'd foot touch'd The lowest stair; and, as it touch'd, life seem'd To pour in at the toes; I mounted up As once fair angels on a ladder flew From the green turf to heaven. "Holy Power," Cry'd I, approaching near the horned shrine, "What am I that another death come not To choke my utterance, sacrilegious, here?" Then said the veiled shadow: "Thou hast felt What 'tis to die and live again before Thy fated hour; that thou hadst power to do so Is thine own safety; thou hast dated on Thy doom." "High Prophetess," said I, "purge off, Benign, if so it please thee, my mind's film." "None can usurp this height," return'd that shade, "But those to whom the miseries of the world Are misery, and will not let them rest. All else who find a haven in the world, Where they may thoughtless sleep away their days, If by a chance into this fane they come, Rot on the pavement where thou rottedst half." "Are there not thousands in the world," said I, Encourag'd by the sooth voice of the shade, "Who love their fellows even to the death, Who feel the giant agony of the world, And more, like slaves to poor humanity, Labour for mortal good? I sure should see Other men here, but I am here alone." "Those whom thou spakest of are no visionaries," Rejoin'd that voice; "they are no dreamers weak; They seek no wonder but the human face, No music but a happy-noted voice: They come not here, they have no thought to come; And thou art here, for thou art less than they. What benefit canst thou do, or all thy tribe, To the great world? Thou art a dreaming thing, A fever of thyself: think of the earth; What bliss, even in hope, is there for thee? What haven? every creature hath its home, Every sole man hath days of joy and pain, Whether his labours be sublime or low -- The pain alone, the joy alone, distinct: Only the dreamer venoms all his days, Bearing more woe than all his sins deserve. Therefore, that happiness be somewhat shared, Such things as thou art are admitted oft Into like gardens thou didst pass erewhile, And suffer'd in these temples: for that cause Thou standest safe beneath this statue's knees." "That I am favour'd for unworthiness, But such propitious parley medicined In sickness not ignoble, I rejoice, Aye, and could weep for love of such award." So answer'd I, continuing, "If it please, Majestic shadow, tell me where I am, Whose altar this, for whom this incense curls; What image this whose face I cannot see For the broad marble knees; and who thou art, Of accent feminine so courteous?" Then the tall shade, in drooping linen veil'd, Spoke out, so much more earnest, that her breath Stirr'd the thin folds of gauze that drooping hung About a golden censer from her hand Pendent; and by her voice I knew she shed Long-treasured tears. "This temple, sad and lone, Is all spar'd from the thunder of a war Foughten long since by giant hierarchy Against rebellion: this old image here, Whose carved features wrinkled as he fell, Is Saturn's; I, Moneta, left supreme, Sole goddess of this desolation." I had no words to answer, for my tongue, Useless, could find about its roofed home No syllable of a fit majesty To make rejoinder of Moneta's mourn: There was a silence, while the altar's blaze Was fainting for sweet food. I look'd thereon, And on the paved floor, where nigh were piled ****s of cinnamon, and many heaps Of other crisped spicewood: then again I look'd upon the altar, and its horns Whiten'd with ashes, and its languorous flame, And then upon the offerings again; And so, by turns, till sad Moneta cry'd: "The sacrifice is done, but not the less Will I be kind to thee for thy good will. My power, which to me is still a curse, Shall be to thee a wonder; for the scenes Still swooning vivid through my globbed brain, With an electral changing misery, Thou shalt with these dull mortal eyes behold Free from all pain, if wonder pain thee not." As near as an immortal's sphered words Could to a mother's soften were these last: And yet I had a terror of her robes, And chiefly of the veils that from her brow Hung pale, and curtain'd her in mysteries, That made my heart too small to hold its blood. This saw that Goddess, and with sacred hand Parted the veils. Then saw I a wan face, Not pin'd by human sorrows, but bright-blanch'd By an immortal sickness which kills not; It works a constant change, which happy death Can put no end to; deathwards progressing To no death was that visage; it had past The lilly and the snow; and beyond these I must not think now, though I saw that face. But for her eyes I should have fled away; They held me back with a benignant light, Soft, mitigated by divinest lids Half-clos'd, and visionless entire they seem'd Of all external things; they saw me not, But in blank splendour beam'd, like the mild moon, Who comforts those she sees not, who knows not What eyes are upward cast. As I had found A grain of gold upon a mountain's side, And, twing'd with avarice, strain'd out my eyes To search its sullen entrails rich with ore, So, at the sad view of Moneta's brow, I ask'd to see what things the hollow brow Behind environ'd: what high tragedy In the dark secret chambers of her skull Was acting, that could give so dread a stress To her cold lips, and fill with such a light Her planetary eyes, and touch her voice With such a sorrow? "Shade of Memory!" Cried I, with act adorant at her feet, "By all the gloom hung round thy fallen house, By this last temple, by the golden age, By Great Apollo, thy dear Foster-child, And by thyself, forlorn divinity, The pale Omega of a wither'd race, Let me behold, according as thou saidst, What in thy brain so ferments to and fro!" No sooner had this conjuration past My devout lips, than side by side we stood (Like a stunt bramble by a solemn pine) Deep in the shady sadness of a vale Far sunken from the healthy breath of morn, Far from the fiery noon and eve's one star. Onward I look'd beneath the gloomy boughs, And saw what first I thought an image huge, Like to the image pedestall'd so high In Saturn's temple; then Moneta's voice Came brief upon mine ear. "So Saturn sat When he had lost his realms;" whereon there grew A power within me of enormous ken To see as a god sees, and take the depth Of things as nimbly as the outward eye Can size and shape pervade. The lofty theme Of those few words hung vast before my mind With half-unravell'd web. I sat myself Upon an eagle's watch, that I might see, And seeing ne'er forget. No stir of life Was in this shrouded vale, -- not so much air As in the zoning of a summer's day Robs not one light seed from the feather'd grass; But where the dead leaf fell there did it rest. A stream went noiseless by, still deaden'd more By reason of the fallen divinity Spreading more shade; the Naiad 'mid her reeds Prest her cold finger closer to her lips. Along the margin-sand large foot-marks went No further than to where old Saturn's feet Had rested, and there slept how long a sleep! Degraded, cold, upon the sodden ground His old right hand lay nerveless, listless, dead, Unsceptred, and his realmless eyes were closed; While his bow'd head seem'd listening to the Earth, His ancient mother, for some comfort yet. It seem'd no force could wake him from his place; But there came one who, with a kindred hand, Touch'd his wide shoulders, after bending low With reverence, though to one who knew it not. Then came the griev'd voice of Mnemosyne, And griev'd I hearken'd. "That divinity Whom thou saw'st step from yon forlornest wood, And with slow pace approach our fallen king, Is Thea, softest-natured of our brood." I mark'd the Goddess, in fair statuary Surpassing wan Moneta by the head, And in her sorrow nearer woman's tears. There was a list'ning fear in her regard, As if calamity had but begun; As if the venom'd clouds of evil days Had spent their malice, and the sullen rear Was with its stored thunder labouring up, One hand she press'd upon that aching spot Where beats the human heart, as if just there, Though an immortal, she felt cruel pain; The other upon Saturn's bended neck She laid, and to the level of his ear Leaning, with parted lips some words she spoke In solemn tenour and deep organ-tone; Some mourning words, which in our feeble tongue Would come in this like accenting; how frail To that large utterance of the early gods! "Saturn, look up! and for what, poor lost king? I have no comfort for thee; no, not one; I cannot say, wherefore thus sleepest thou? For Heaven is parted from thee, and the Earth Knows thee not, so afflicted, for a god. The Ocean, too, with all its solemn noise, Has from thy sceptre pass'd; and all the air Is emptied of thy hoary majesty. Thy thunder, captious at the new command, Rumbles reluctant o'er our fallen house; And thy sharp lightning, in unpractis'd hands, Scourges and burns our once serene domain. "With such remorseless speed still come new woes, That unbelief has not a space to breathe. Saturn! sleep on: me thoughtless, why should I Thus violate thy slumbrous solitude? Why should I ope thy melancholy eyes? Saturn! sleep on, while at thy feet I weep." As when upon a tranced summer-night Forests, branch-charmed by the earnest stars, Dream, and so dream all night without a noise, Save from one gradual solitary gust Swelling upon the silence, dying off, As if the ebbing air had but one wave, So came these words and went; the while in tears She prest her fair large forehead to the earth, Just where her fallen hair might spread in curls, A soft and silken net for Saturn's feet. Long, long these two were postured motionless, Like sculpture builded-up upon the grave Or their own power. A long awful time I look'd upon them: still they were the same; The frozen God still bending to the earth, And the sad Goddess weeping at his feet; Moneta silent. Without stay or prop But my own weak mortality, I bore The load of this eternal quietude, The unchanging gloom and the three fixed shapes Ponderous upon my senses, a whole moon; For by my burning brain I measured sure Her silver seasons shedded on the night. And every day by day methought I grew More gaunt and ghostly. Oftentimes I pray'd Intense, that death would take me from the vale And all its burthens; gasping with despair Of change, hour after hour I curs'd myself, Until old Saturn rais'd his faded eyes, And look'd around and saw his kingdom gone, And all the gloom and sorrow of the place, And that fair kneeling Goddess at his feet. As the moist scent of flowers, and grass, and leaves, Fills forest-dells with a pervading air, Known to the woodland nostril, so the words Of Saturn fill'd the mossy glooms around, Even to the hollows of time-eaten oaks, And to the windings of the foxes' hole, With sad, low tones, while thus he spoke, and sent Strange moanings to the solitary Pan. "Moan, brethren, moan, for we are swallow'd up And buried from all godlike exercise Of influence benign on planets pale, And peaceful sway upon man's harvesting, And all those acts which Deity supreme Doth ease its heart of love in. Moan and wail; Moan, brethren, moan; for lo, the rebel spheres Spin round; the stars their ancient courses keep; Clouds still with shadowy moisture haunt the earth, Still suck their fill of light from sun and moon; Still buds the tree, and still the seashores murmur; There is no death in all the universe, No smell of death. -- There shall be death. Moan, moan, Moan, Cybele, moan; for thy pernicious babes Weak as the reed, weak, feeble as my voice. Oh! Oh! the pain, the pain of feebleness; Moan, moan, for still I thaw; or give me help; Throw down those imps, and give me victory. Let me hear other groans, and trumpets blown Of triumph calm, and hymns of festival, From the gold peaks of heaven's high-piled clouds; Voices of soft proclaim, and silver stir Of strings in hollow shells; and there shall be Beautiful things made new, for the surprise Of the sky-children." So he feebly ceased, With such a poor and sickly-sounding pause, Methought I heard some old man of the earth Bewailing earthly loss; nor could my eyes And ears act with that unison of sense Which marries sweet sound with the grace of form, And dolorous accent from a tragic harp With large-limb'd visions. More I scrutinized. Still fixt he sat beneath the sable trees, Whose arms spread straggling in wild serpent forms With leaves all hush'd; his awful presence there (Now all was silent) gave a deadly lie To what I erewhile heard: only his lips Trembled amid the white curls of his beard; They told the truth, though round the snowy locks Hung nobly, as upon the face of heaven A mid-day fleece of clouds. Thea arose, And stretcht her white arm through the hollow dark, Pointing some whither: whereat he too rose, Like a vast giant, seen by men at sea To grow pale from the waves at dull midnight. They melted from my sight into the woods; Ere I could turn, Moneta cry'd, "These twain Are speeding to the families of grief, Where, rooft in by black rocks, they waste in pain And darkness, for no hope." And she spake on, As ye may read who can unwearied pass Onward from the antechamber of this dream, Where, even at the open doors, awhile I must delay, and glean my memory Of her high phrase -- perhaps no further dare. CANTO II. "Mortal, that thou may'st understand aright, I humanize my sayings to thine ear, Making comparisons of earthly things; Or thou might'st better listen to the wind, Whose language is to thee a barren noise, Though it blows legend-laden thro' the trees. In melancholy realms big tears are shed, More sorrow like to this, and such like woe, Too huge for mortal tongue or pen of scribe. The Titans fierce, self-hid or prison-bound, Groan for the old allegiance once more, Listening in their doom for Saturn's voice. But one of the whole eagle-brood still keeps His sovereignty, and rule, and majesty: Blazing Hyperion on his orbed fire Still sits, still snuffs the incense teeming up From Man to the Sun's God -- yet insecure. For as upon the earth dire prodigies Fright and perplex, so also shudders he; Not at dog's howl or gloom-bird's hated screech, Or the familiar visiting of one Upon the first toll of his passing bell, Or prophesyings of the midnight lamp; But horrors, portioned to a giant nerve, Make great Hyperion ache. His palace bright, Bastion'd with pyramids of shining gold, And touch'd with shade of bronzed obelisks, Glares a blood-red thro' all the thousand courts, Arches, and domes, and fiery galleries; And all its curtains of Aurorian clouds Flash angerly; when he would taste the wreaths Of incense, breath'd aloft from sacred hills, Instead of sweets, his ample palate takes Savour of poisonous brass and metals sick; Wherefore when harbour'd in the sleepy West, After the full completion of fair day, For rest divine upon exalted couch, And slumber in the arms of melody, He paces through the pleasant hours of ease, With strides colossal, on from hall to hall, While far within each aisle and deep recess His winged minions in close clusters stand Amaz'd, and full of fear; like anxious men, Who on a wide plain gather in sad troops, When earthquakes jar their battlements and towers. Even now where Saturn, rous'd from icy trance, Goes step for step with Thea from yon woods, Hyperion, leaving twilight in the rear, Is sloping to the threshold of the West. Thither we tend." Now in the clear light I stood, Reliev'd from the dusk vale. Mnemosyne Was sitting on a square-edg'd polish'd stone, That in its lucid depth reflected pure Her priestess' garments. My quick eyes ran on From stately nave to nave, from vault to vault, Through bow'rs of fragrant and enwreathed light, And diamond-paved lustrous long arcades. Anon rush'd by the bright Hyperion; His flaming robes stream'd out beyond his heels, And gave a roar as if of earthy fire, That scar'd away the meek ethereal hours, And made their dove-wings tremble. On he flared. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes ~ John Keats, Hyperion, A Vision - Attempted Reconstruction Of The Poem

56:Admetus: To My Friend, Ralph Waldo Emerson He who could beard the lion in his lair, To bind him for a girl, and tame the boar, And drive these beasts before his chariot, Might wed Alcestis. For her low brows' sake, Her hairs' soft undulations of warm gold, Her eyes' clear color and pure virgin mouth, Though many would draw bow or shiver spear, Yet none dared meet the intolerable eye, Or lipless tusk, of lion or of boar. This heard Admetus, King of Thessaly, Whose broad, fat pastures spread their ample fields Down to the sheer edge of Amphrysus' stream, Who laughed, disdainful, at the father's pride, That set such value on one milk-faced child. One morning, as he rode alone and passed Through the green twilight of Thessalian woods, Between two pendulous branches interlocked, As through an open casement, he descried A goddess, as he deemed, — in truth a maid. On a low bank she fondled tenderly A favorite hound, her floral face inclined Above the glossy, graceful animal, That pressed his snout against her cheek and gazed Wistfully, with his keen, sagacious eyes. One arm with lax embrace the neck enwreathed, With polished roundness near the sleek, gray skin. Admetus, fixed with wonder, dared not pass, Intrusive on her holy innocence And sacred girlhood, but his fretful steed Snuffed the large air, and champed and pawed the ground; And hearing this, the maiden raised her head. No let or hindrance then might stop the king, Once having looked upon those supreme eyes. The drooping boughs disparting, forth he sped, And then drew in his steed, to ask the path, Like a lost traveller in an alien land. Although each river-cloven vale, with streams Arrowy glancing to the blue Ægean, Each hallowed mountain, the abode of gods, Pelion and Ossa fringed with haunted groves, The height, spring-crowned, of dedicate Olympus, And pleasant sun-fed vineyards, were to him Familiar as his own face in the stream, Nathless he paused and asked the maid what path Might lead him from the forest. She replied, But still he tarried, and with sportsman's praise Admired the hound and stooped to stroke its head, And asked her if she hunted. Nay, not she: Her father Pelias hunted in these woods, Where there was royal game. He knew her now, — Alcestis, — and her left her with due thanks: No goddess, but a mortal, to be won By such a simple feat as driving boars And lions to his chariot. What was that To him who saw the boar of Calydon, The sacred boar of Artemis, at bay In the broad stagnant marsh, and sent his darts In its tough, quivering flank, and saw its death, Stung by sure arrows of Arcadian nymph? To river-pastures of his flocks and herds Admetus rode, where sweet-breathed cattle grazed, Heifers and goats and kids, and foolish sheep Dotted cool, spacious meadows with bent heads, And necks' soft wool broken in yellow flakes, Nibbling sharp-toothed the rich, thick-growing blades. One herdsmen kept the innumerable droves — A boy yet, young as immortality — In listless posture on a vine-grown rock. Around him huddled kids and sheep that left The mother's udder for his nighest grass, Which sprouted with fresh verdure where he sat. And yet dull neighboring rustics never guessed A god had been among them till he went, Although with him they acted as he willed, Renouncing shepherds' silly pranks and quips, 10 Because his very presence made them grave. Amphryssius, after their translucent stream, They called him, but Admetus knew his name, — Hyperion, god of sun and song and silver speech, Condemned to serve a mortal for his sin To Zeus in sending violent darts of death, And raising hand irreverent, against The one-eyed forgers of the thunderbolt. For shepherd's crook he held the living rod Of twisted serpents, later Hermes' wand. Him sought the king, discovering soon hard by, Idle, as one in nowise bound to time, Watching the restless grasses blow and wave, The sparkle of the sun upon the stream, Regretting nothing, living with the hour: For him, who had his light and song within, Was naught that did not shine, and all things sang. Admetus prayed for his celestial aid To win Alcestis, which the god vouchsafed, Granting with smiles, as grant all gods, who smite With stern hand, sparing not for piteousness, But give their gifts in gladness. Thus the king Led with loose rein the beasts as tame as kine, And townsfolk thronged within the city streets, As round a god; and mothers showed their babes, And maidens loved the crowned intrepid youth, And men would worship, though the very god Who wrought the wonder dwelled unnoted nigh, Divinely scornful of neglect or praise. Then Pelias, seeing this would be his son, As he had vowed, called for his wife and child. With Anaxibia, Alcestis came, A warm flush spreading o'er her eager face In looking on the rider of the woods, And knowing him her suitor and the king. Admetus won Alcestis thus to wife, And these with mated hearts and mutual love 11 Lived a life blameless, beautiful: the king Ordaining justice in the gates; the queen, With grateful offerings to the household gods, Wise with the wisdom of the pure in heart. One child she bore, — Eumelus, — and he throve. Yet none the less because they sacrificed The firstlings of their flocks and fruits and flowers, Did trouble come; for sickness seized the king. Alcestis watched with many-handed love, But unavailing service, for he lay With languid limbs, despite his ancient strength Of sinew, and his skill with spear and sword. His mother came, Clymene, and with her His father, Pheres: his unconscious child They brought him, while forlorn Alcestis sat Discouraged, with the face of desolation. The jealous gods would bind his mouth from speech, And smite his vigorous frame with impotence; And ruin with bitter ashes, worms, and dust, The beauty of his crowned, exalted head. He knew her presence, — soon he would not know, Nor feel her hand in his lie warm and close, Nor care if she were near him any more. Exhausted with long vigils, thus the queen Held hard and grievous thoughts, till heavy sleep Possessed her weary senses, and she dreamed. And even in her dream her trouble lived, For she was praying in a barren field To all the gods for help, when came across The waste of air and land, from distant skies, A spiritual voice divinely clear, Whose unimaginable sweetness thrilled Her aching heart with tremor of strange joy: 'Arise, Alcestis, cast away white fear. A god dwells with you: seek, and you shall find.' Then quiet satisfaction filled her soul Almost akin to gladness, and she woke. Weak as the dead, Admetus lay there still; But she, superb with confidence, arose, And passed beyond the mourners' curious eyes, Seeking Amphryssius in the meadow-lands. She found him with the godlike mien of one 12 Who, roused, awakens unto deeds divine: 'I come, Hyperion, with incessant tears, To crave the life of my dear lord the king. Pity me, for I see the future years Widowed and laden with disastrous days. And ye, the gods, will miss him when the fires Upon your shrines, unfed, neglected die. Who will pour large libations in your names, And sacrifice with generous piety? Silence and apathy will greet you there Where once a splendid spirit offered praise. Grant me this boon divine, and I will beat With prayer at morning's gates, before they ope Unto thy silver-hoofed and flame-eyed steeds. Answer ere yet the irremeable stream Be crossed: answer, O god, and save!' She ceased, With full throat salt with tears, and looked on him, And with a sudden cry of awe fell prone, For, lo! he was transmuted to a god; The supreme aureole radiant round his brow, Divine refulgence on his face, — his eyes Awful with splendor, and his august head With blinding brilliance crowned by vivid flame. Then in a voice that charmed the listening air: 'Woman, arise! I have no influence On Death, who is the servant of the Fates. Howbeit for thy passion and thy prayer, The grace of thy fair womanhood and youth, Thus godlike will I intercede for thee, And sue the insatiate sisters for this life. Yet hope not blindly: loth are these to change Their purpose; neither will they freely give, But haggling lend or sell: perchance the price Will countervail the boon. Consider this. Now rise and look upon me.' And she rose, But by her stood no godhead bathed in light, But young Amphryssius, herdsman to the king, Benignly smiling. Fleet as thought, the god Fled from the glittering earth to blackest depths Of Tartarus; and none might say he sped 13 On wings ambrosial, or with feet as swift As scouring hail, or airy chariot Borne by flame-breathing steeds ethereal; But with a motion inconceivable Departed and was there. Before the throne Of Ades, first he hailed the long-sought queen, Stolen with violent hands from grassy fields And delicate airs of sunlit Sicily, Pensive, gold-haired, but innocent-eyed no more As when she laughing plucked the daffodils, But grave as one fulfilling a strange doom. And low at Ades' feet, wrapped in grim murk And darkness thick, the three gray women sat, Loose-robed and chapleted with wool and flowers, Purple narcissi round their horrid hair. Intent upon her task, the first one held The slender thread that at a touch would snap; The second weaving it with warp and woof Into strange textures, some stained dark and foul, Some sanguine-colored, and some black as night, And rare ones white, or with a golden thread Running throughout the web: the farthest hag With glistening scissors cut her sisters' work. To these Hyperion, but they never ceased, Nor raised their eyes, till with soft, moderate tones, But by their powerful persuasiveness Commanding all to listen and obey, He spoke, and all hell heard, and these three looked And waited his request: 'I come, a god, At a pure mortal queen's request, who sues For life renewed unto her dying lord, Admetus; and I also pray this prayer.' 'Then cease, for when hath Fate been moved by prayer?' 'But strength and upright heart should serve with you.' 'Nay, these may serve with all but Destiny.' 'I ask ye not forever to forbear, But spare a while, — a moment unto us, A lifetime unto men.' 'The Fates swerve not For supplications, like the pliant gods. Have they not willed a life's thread should be cut? With them the will is changeless as the deed. 14 O men! ye have not learned in all the past, Desires are barren and tears yield no fruit. How long will ye besiege the thrones of gods With lamentations? When lagged Death for all Your timorous shirking? We work not like you, Delaying and relenting, purposeless, With unenduring issues; but our deeds, Forever interchained and interlocked, Complete each other and explain themselves.' 'Ye will a life: then why not any life?' 'What care we for the king? He is not worth These many words; indeed, we love not speech. We care not if he live, or lose such life As men are greedy for, — filled full with hate, Sins beneath scorn, and only lit by dreams, Or one sane moment, or a useless hope, — Lasting how long? — the space between the green And fading yellow of the grass they tread.' But he withdrawing not: 'Will any life Suffice ye for Admetus?' 'Yea,' the crones Three times repeated. 'We know no such names As king or queen or slave: we want but life. Begone, and vex us in our work no more.' With broken blessings, inarticulate joy And tears, Alcestis thanked Hyperion, And worshipped. Then he gently: 'Who will die, So that the king may live?' And she: 'You ask? Nay, who will live when life clasps hands with shame, And death with honor? Lo, you are a god; You cannot know the highest joy of life, — To leave it when 't is worthier to die. His parents, kinsmen, courtiers, subjects, slaves, — For love of him myself would die, were none Found ready; but what Greek would stand to see A woman glorified, and falter? Once, And only once, the gods will do this thing In all the ages: such a man themselves Delight to honor, — holy, temperate, chaste, 15 With reverence for his dæmon and his god.' Thus she triumphant to the very door Of King Admetus' chamber. All there saw Her ill-timed gladness with much wonderment. But she: 'No longer mourn! The king is saved: The Fates will spare him. Lift your voice in praise; Sing pæans to Apollo; crown your brows With laurel; offer thankful sacrifice!' 'O Queen, what mean these foolish words misplaced? And what an hour is this to thank the Fates?' 'Thrice blessed be the gods! — for God himself Has sued for me, — they are not stern and deaf. Cry, and they answer: commune with your soul, And they send counsel: weep with rainy grief, And these will sweeten you your bitterest tears. On one condition King Admetus lives, And ye, on hearing, will lament no more, Each emulous to save.' Then — for she spake Assured, as having heard an oracle — They asked: 'What deed of ours may serve the king?' 'The Fates accept another life for his, And one of you may die.' Smiling, she ceased. But silence answered her. 'What! do ye thrust Your arrows in your hearts beneath your cloaks, Dying like Greeks, too proud to own the pang? This ask I not. In all the populous land But one need suffer for immortal praise. The generous Fates have sent no pestilence, Famine, nor war: it is as though they gave Freely, and only make the boon more rich By such slight payment. Now a people mourns, And ye may change the grief to jubilee, Filling the cities with a pleasant sound. But as for me, what faltering words can tell My joy, in extreme sharpness kin to pain? A monument you have within my heart, Wreathed with kind love and dear remembrances; And I will pray for you before I crave Pardon and pity for myself from God. Your name will he the highest in the land, 16 Oftenest, fondest on my grateful lips, After the name of him you die to save. What! silent still? Since when has virtue grown Less beautiful than indolence and ease? Is death more terrible, more hateworthy, More bitter than dishonor? Will ye live On shame? Chew and find sweet its poisoned fruits? What sons will ye bring forth — mean-souled like you, Or, like your parents, brave — to blush like girls, And say, 'Our fathers were afraid to die!' Ye will not dare to raise heroic eyes Unto the eyes of aliens. In the streets Will women and young children point at you Scornfully, and the sun will find you shamed, And night refuse to shield you. What a life Is this ye spin and fashion for yourselves! And what new tortures of suspense and doubt Will death invent for such as are afraid! Acastus, thou my brother, in the field Foremost, who greeted me with sanguine hands From ruddy battle with a conqueror's face, — These honors wilt thou blot with infamy? Nay, thou hast won no honors: a mere girl Would do as much as thou at such a time, In clamorous battle, 'midst tumultuous sounds, Neighing of war-steeds, shouts of sharp command, Snapping of shivered spears; for all are brave When all men look to them expectantly; But he is truly brave who faces death Within his chamber, at a sudden call, At night, when no man sees, — content to die When life can serve no longer those he loves.' Then thus Acastus: 'Sister, I fear not Death, nor the empty darkness of the grave, And hold my life but as a little thing, Subject unto my people's call, and Fate. But if 't is little, no greater is the king's; And though my heart bleeds sorely, I recall Astydamia, who thus would mourn for me. We are not cowards, we youth of Thessaly, And Thessaly — yea, all Greece — knoweth it; Nor will we brook the name from even you, 17 Albeit a queen, and uttering these wild words Through your unwonted sorrow.' Then she knew That he stood firm, and turning from him, cried To the king's parents: 'Are ye deaf with grief, Pheres, Clymene? Ye can save your son, Yet rather stand and weep with barren tears. O, shame! to think that such gray, reverend hairs Should cover such unvenerable heads! What would ye lose?— a remnant of mere life, A few slight raveled threads, and give him years To fill with glory. Who, when he is gone, Will call you gentlest names this side of heaven, — Father and mother? Knew ye not this man Ere he was royal, — a poor, helpless child, Crownless and kingdomless? One birth alone Sufficeth not, Clymene: once again You must give life with travail and strong pain. Has he not lived to outstrip your swift hopes? What mother can refuse a second birth To such a son? But ye denying him, What after-offering may appease the gods? What joy outweigh the grief of this one day? What clamor drown the hours' myriad tongues, Crying, 'Your son, your son? where is your son, Unnatural mother, timid, foolish man?' Then Pheres gravely: 'These are graceless words From you our daughter. Life is always life, And death comes soon enough to such as we. We twain are old and weak, have served our time, And made our sacrifices. Let the young Arise now in their turn and save the king.' 'O gods! look on your creatures! do ye see? And seeing, have ye patience? Smite them all, Unsparing, with dishonorable death. Vile slaves! a woman teaches you to die. Intrepid, with exalted steadfast soul, Scorn in my heart, and love unutterable, I yield the Fates my life, and like a god Command them to revere that sacred head. Thus kiss I thrice the dear, blind, holy eyes, And bid them see; and thrice I kiss this brow, And thus unfasten I the pale, proud lips 18 With fruitful kissings, bringing love and life, And without fear or any pang, I breathe My soul in him.' 'Alcestis, I awake. I hear, I hear — unspeak thy reckless words! For, lo! thy life-blood tingles in my veins, And streameth through my body like new wine. Behold! thy spirit dedicate revives My pulse, and through thy sacrifice I breathe. Thy lips are bloodless: kiss me not again. Ashen thy cheeks, faded thy flowerlike hands. O woman! perfect in thy womanhood And in thy wifehood, I adjure thee now As mother, by the love thou bearest our child, In this thy hour of passion and of love, Of sacrifice and sorrow, to unsay Thy words sublime!' 'I die that thou mayest live.' 'And deemest thou that I accept the boon, Craven, like these my subjects? Lo, my queen, Is life itself a lovely thing, — bare life? And empty breath a thing desirable? Or is it rather happiness and love That make it precious to its inmost core? When these are lost, are there not swords in Greece, And flame and poison, deadly waves and plagues? No man has ever lacked these things and gone Unsatisfied. It is not these the gods refuse (Nay, never clutch my sleeve and raise thy lip), — Not these I seek; but I will stab myself, Poison my life and burn my flesh, with words, And save or follow thee. Lo! hearken now: I bid the gods take back their loathsome gifts: I spurn them, and I scorn them, and I hate. Will they prove deaf to this as to my prayers? With tongue reviling, blasphemous, I curse, With mouth polluted from deliberate heart. Dishonored be their names, scorned be their priests, Ruined their altars, mocked their oracles! It is Admetus, King of Thessaly, Defaming thus: annihilate him, gods! So that his queen, who worships you, may live.' He paused as one expectant; but no bolt 19 From the insulted heavens answered him, But awful silence followed. Then a hand, A boyish hand, upon his shoulder fell, And turning, he beheld his shepherd boy, Not wrathful, but divinely pitiful, Who spake in tender, thrilling tones: 'The gods Cannot recall their gifts. Blaspheme them not: Bow down and worship rather. Shall he curse Who sees not, and who hears not, — neither knows Nor understands? Nay, thou shalt bless and pray, — Pray, for the pure heart, purged by prayer, divines And seeth when the bolder eyes are blind. Worship and wonder, — these befit a man At every hour; and mayhap will the gods Yet work a miracle for knees that bend And hands that supplicate.' Then all they knew A sudden sense of awe, and bowed their heads Beneath the stripling's gaze: Admetus fell, Crushed by that gentle touch, and cried aloud: 'Pardon and pity! I am hard beset.' There waited at the doorway of the king One grim and ghastly, shadowy, horrible, Bearing the likeness of a king himself, Erect as one who serveth not, — upon His head a crown, within his fleshless hands A sceptre, — monstrous, winged, intolerable. To him a stranger coming 'neath the trees, Which slid down flakes of light, now on his hair, Close-curled, now on his bared and brawny chest, Now on his flexile, vine-like veinéd limbs, With iron network of strong muscle thewed, And godlike brows and proud mouth unrelaxed. Firm was his step; no superfluity Of indolent flesh impeded this man's strength. Slender and supple every perfect limb, Beautiful with the glory of a man. No weapons bare he, neither shield: his hands Folded upon his breast, his movements free Of all incumbrance. When his mighty strides 20 Had brought him nigh the waiting one, he paused: 'Whose palace this? and who art thou, grim shade?' 'The palace of the King of Thessaly, And my name is not strange unto thine ears; For who hath told men that I wait for them, The one sure thing on earth? Yet all they know, Unasking and yet answered. I am Death, The only secret that the gods reveal. But who art thou who darest question me?' 'Alcides; and that thing I dare not do Hath found no name. Whom here awaitest thou?' 'Alcestis, Queen of Thessaly, — a queen Who wooed me as the bridegroom woos the bride, For her life sacrificed will save her lord Admetus, as the Fates decreed. I wait Impatient, eager; and I enter soon, With darkening wing, invisible, a god, And kiss her lips, and kiss her throbbing heart, And then the tenderest hands can do no more Than close her eyes and wipe her cold, white brow, Inurn her ashes and strew flowers above.' 'This woman is a god, a hero, Death. In this her sacrifice I see a soul Luminous, starry: earth can spare her not: It is not rich enough in purity To lose this paragon. Save her, O Death! Thou surely art more gentle than the Fates, Yet these have spared her lord, and never meant That she should suffer, and that this their grace, Beautiful, royal on one side, should turn Sudden and show a fearful, fatal face.' 'Nay, have they not? O fond and foolish man, Naught comes unlooked for, unforeseen by them. Doubt when they favor thee, though thou mayest laugh When they have scourged thee with an iron scourge. Behold, their smile is deadlier than their sting, And every boon of theirs is double-faced. Yea, I am gentler unto ye than these: I slay relentless, but when have I mocked With poisoned gifts, and generous hands that smite Under the flowers? for my name is Truth. Were this fair queen more fair, more pure, more chaste, 21 I would not spare her for your wildest prayer Nor her best virtue. Is the earth's mouth full? Is the grave satisfied? Discrown me then, For life is lord, and men may mock the gods With immortality.' 'I sue no more, But I command thee spare this woman's life, Or wrestle with Alcides.' 'Wrestle with thee, Thou puny boy!' And Death laughed loud, and swelled To monstrous bulk, fierce-eyed, with outstretched wings, And lightnings round his brow; but grave and firm, Strong as a tower, Alcides waited him, And these began to wrestle, and a cloud Impenetrable fell, and all was dark. 'Farewell, Admetus and my little son, Eumelus, — O these clinging baby hands! Thy loss is bitter, for no chance, no fame, No wealth of love, can ever compensate For a dead mother. Thou, O king, fulfill The double duty: love him with my love, And make him bold to wrestle, shiver spears, Noble and manly, Grecian to the bone; And tell him that his mother spake with gods. Farewell, farewell! Mine eyes are growing blind: The darkness gathers. O my heart, my heart!' No sound made answer save the cries of grief From all the mourners, and the suppliance Of strick'n Admetus: ' O have mercy, gods! O gods, have mercy, mercy upon us!' Then from the dying woman's couch again Her voice was heard, but with strange sudden tones: 'Lo, I awake, — the light comes back to me. What miracle is this?' And thunders shook The air, and clouds of mighty darkness fell, And the earth trembled, and weird, horrid sounds Were heard of rushing wings and fleeing feet, And groans; and all were silent, dumb with awe, Saving the king, who paused not in his prayer: 'Have mercy, gods!' and then again, 'O gods, Have mercy!' 22 Through the open casement poured Bright floods of sunny light; the air was soft, Clear, delicate as though a summer storm Had passed away; and those there standing saw, Afar upon the plain, Death fleeing thence, And at the doorway, weary, well-nigh spent, Alcides, flushed with victory. ~ Emma Lazarus

57:Virgils Gnat Wrong'd, yet not daring to expresse my paine, To you (great Lord) the causer of my care, In clowdie teares my case I thus complaine Vnto yourselfe, that onely priuie are: But if that any Oedipus vnware Shall chaunce, through power of some diuining spright, To reade the secrete of this riddle rare, And know the purporte of my euill plight, Let him rest pleased with his owne insight, Ne further seeke to glose vpon the text: For griefe enough it is to grieued wight To feele his fault, and not be further vext. But what so by my selfe may not be showen, May by this Gnatts complaint be easily knowen. We now haue playde (Augustus) wantonly, Tuning our song vnto a tender Muse, And like a cobweb weauing slenderly, Haue onely playde: let thus much then excuse This Gnats small Poeme, that th' whole history Is but a jest, though envie it abuse: But who such sports and sweet delights doth blame, Shall lighter seeme than this Gnats idle name. Hereafter, when as season more secure Shall bring forth fruit, this Muse shall speak to thee In bigger notes, that may thy sense allure, And for thy worth frame some fit Poesie, The golden offspring of Latona pure, And ornament of great Ioues progenie, Phoebus shall be the author of my song, Playing on iuorie harp with siluer strong. He shall inspire my verse with gentle mood Of Poets Prince, whether he woon beside Faire Xanthus sprincled with Chimæras blood; Or in the woods of Astery abide; Or whereas mount Parnasse, the Muses brood, 433 Doth his broad forhead like two hornes diuide, And the sweete waues of sounding Castaly With liquid foote doth slide downe easily. Wherefore ye Sisters which the glorie bee Of the Pierian streames, fayre Naiades, Go too, and dauncing all in companie, Adorne that God: and thou holie Pales, To whome the honest care of husbandrie Returneth by continuall successe, Haue care for to pursue his footing light; Throgh the wide woods, & groues, with green leaues dight. Professing thee I lifted am aloft Betwixt the forrest wide and starrie sky: And thou most dread (Octauius) which oft To learned wits giuest courage worthily, O come (thou sacred childe) come sliding soft, And fauour my beginnings graciously: For not these leaues do sing that dreadfull stound, When Giants bloud did staine Phlegræan ground. Nor how th' halfe horsy people, Centaures hight, Fought with the bloudie Lapithaes at bord, Nor how the East with tyranous despight Burnt th Attick towres, and people slew with sword; Was digged downe, nor yron bands abord The Pontick sea by their huge Nauy cast, My volume shall renowne, so long since past. Nor Hellespont trampled with horses feete, When flocking Persians did the Greeks affray; But my soft Muse, as for her power more meete, Delights (with Phoebus friendly leaue) to play An easie running verse with tender feete. And thou (dread sacred child) to thee alway, Let euerlasting lightsome glory striue, Through the worlds endles ages to suruiue. And let an happie roome remaine for thee Mongst heauenly ranks, where blessed soules do rest; And let long lasting life with ioyous glee, 434 As thy due meede that thou deseruest best, Hereafter many yeares remembred be Amongst good men, of whom thou oft are blest; Liue thou for euer in all happinesse: But let us turne to our first businesse. The fiery sun was mounted now on hight Vp to the heauenly towers, and shot each where Out of his golden Charet glistering light; And fayre Aurora with her rosie heare, The hatefull darknes now had put to flight, When as the shepheard seeing day appeare, His little Goats gan driue out of their stalls, To feede abroad, where pasture best befalls. To an high mountaines top he with them went, Where thickest grasse did cloath the open hills: They now amongst the woods and thickets ment, Now in the valleies wandring at their wills, Spread themselues farre abroad through each descent; Some on the soft greene grasse feeding their fills; Some clambring through the hollow cliffes on hy, Nibble the bushie shrubs, which growe thereby. Others the vtmost boughs of trees doe crop, And brouze the woodbine twigges, that freshly bud This with full bit doth catch the vtmost top Of some soft Willow, or new growen stud; This with sharpe teeth the brambles leaues doth lop, And chaw the tender prickles in her Cud; The whiles another high doth ouerlooke Her owne like image in christall brooke. O the great happines, which shepheards haue, Who so loathes not too much the poor estate, With minde that ill vse doth before depraue, Ne measures all things by the costly rate Of riotise, and semblants outward braue; No such sad cares, as wont to macerate And rend the greedie mindes of couetous men, Do euer creepe into the shepheards den. 435 Ne cares he if the fleece, which him arayes, Be not twice steeped in Assyrian dye, Ne glistering of golde, which vnderlayes The summer beames, doe blinde his gazing eye. Ne pictures beautie, nor the glauncing rayes Of precious stones, whence no good commeth by; Of Bætus or of Alcons vanity. Ne ought the whelky pearles esteemeth hee, Which are from Indian seas brought far away: But with pure brest from carefull sorrow free, On the soft grasse his limbs doth oft display, In sweete spring time, when flowres varietie With sundrie colours paints the sprincled lay; There lyin all at ease, from guile or spight, With pype of fennie reedes doth him delight. There he, Lord of himselfe, with palme bedight, His looser locks doth wrap in wreath of vine: There his milk dropping Goats be his delight, And fruitful Pales, and the forrest greene, And darkesome caues in pleasaunt vallies pight, Whereas continuall shade is to be seene, And where fresh sprining wells, as christall neate, Do alwayes flow, to quench his thirstie heate. O who can lead them to a more happie life, Than he, that with cleane minde and heart sincere, No greedy riches knowes nor bloudie strife, No deadly fight of warlick fleete doth feare, Ne runs in perill of foes cruell knife, That in the sacred temples he may reare, A trophee of his glittering spoyels and treasure, Or may abound in riches aboue measure. Of him his God is worshipt with his sythe, And not with skill of craftsman polished: He ioyes in groues, and makes himselfe full blythe, With sundrie flowers in wilde fieldes gathered; Ne frankincens he from Panchæa buyth, Sweete quiet harbours in his harmeles head, And perfect pleasure builds her iouyous bowre, 436 Free from sad cares, that rich mens hearts deuowre. This all his care, this all his whole indeuour, To this his minde and senses he doth bend, How he may flow in quiets matchles treasour, Content with any food that God doth send; And how his limbs, resolu'd through idle leisour, Vnto sweete sleepe he may securely lend, In some coole shadow from the scorching heate, The whiles his flock their chawed cuds do eate. O flocks, O Faunes, and O ye pleasaunt springs Of Tempe, where the countrey Nymphs are rife, Through whose not costly care each shepheard sings As merrie notes vpon his rusticke Fife, As that Ascræan bard, whose fame now rings Through the wide world, and leads as ioyfull life. Free from all troubles and from worldly toyle, In which fond men doe all their dayes turmoyle. In such delights whilst thus his carelesse time This shepheard driues, vpleaning on his batt, And on shrill reedes chaunting his rustick rime, Hyperion throwing foorth his beames full hott, Into the highest top of heauen gan clime, And the world parting by an equall lott, Did shed his whirling flames on either side, As the great Ocean doth himselfe diuide. Then gan the shepheard gather into one His stragling Goates, and draue them to a foord, Whose cærule streame, rombling in Pible stone, Crept vnder mosse as greene as any goord. Now had the Sun halfe heauen ouergone, When he heard back from that water foord, Draue from the force of Phoebus boyling ray, Into thick shadowes, there themselues to lay. Soone as he them plac'd in thy sacred wood (O Delian Goddesse) saw, to which of yore Came the bad daughter of old Cadmus brood, Cruell Agaue, flying vengeance sore 437 Of king Nictilus for the guiltie blood, Which she with cursed hands had shed before; There she halfe frantick hauing slaine her sonne, Did shrowd her selfe like punishment to shonne. Here also playing on the grassy greene, Woodgods, and Satyres, and swift Dryades, With many Fairies oft were dauncing seene. Not so much did Dan Orpheus represse, The streames of Hebrus with his songs I weene, As that faire troupe of woodie Goddesses Staied thee, (O Peneus) powring foorth to thee, From cheereful lookes great mirth & gladsome glee. The verie nature of the place, resounding With gentle murmure of the breathing ayre, A pleasant bowre with all delight abounding In the fresh shadowe did for them prepayre, To rest their limbs with wearines redounding. For first the high Plaine trees with braunches faire, Out of the lowly vallies did arise, And high shoote vp their heads into the skyes. And them amongst the wicked Lotos grew, Wicked, for holding guilefully away Vlysses men, whom rapt with sweetnes new, Taking to hoste, it quite from him did stay, And eke those trees, in whose transformed hew The Sunnes sad daughters waylde the rash decay Of Phaeton, whose limbs with lightning rent, They gathering vp, with sweete teares did lament. And that same tree, in which Demophoon, By his disloyalty lamented sore, Eternall hurte left vnto many one: Whom als accompanied the Oke, of yore Through fatall charmes transformd to such an one: The Oke, whose Acornes were our foode, before That Ceres seede of mortall men were knowne, Which first Triptoleme taught how to be sowne. Here also grew the rougher rinded Pine, 438 The great Argoan ships braue ornament Whom golden Fleece did make an heauenly signe; Which coueting, with his high tops extent, To make the mountaines touch the starres diuine, Decks all the forrest with embellishment, And the blacke Holme that loues the watrie vale, And the sweete Cypresse signe of deadly bale. Emongst the rest the clambring Yuie grew, Knitting his wanton armes with grasping hold, Least that the Poplar happely should rew Her brothers strokes, whose boughes she doth enfold With her lythe twigs, till they the top survew, And paint with pallid greene her buds of gold. Next did the Myrtle tree to her approach, Not yet vnmindfull of her olde reproach. But the small Birds in their wide boughs embowring, Chaunted their sundrie tunes with sweete consent, And vnder them a siluer Spring forth powring His trickling streames, a gentle murmure sent; Thereto the frogs, bred in the slimie scowring Of the moist moores, their iarring voyces bent; And shrill grashoppers chirped them around: All which the ayrie Echo did resound. In this so pleasant place this Shepheards flocke Lay euerie where, their wearie limbs to rest, On euerie bush, and euerie hollow rocke Where breathe on them the whistling wind mote best; The whiles the Shepheard self tending his stocke, Sate by the fountaine side, in shade to rest, Where gentle slumbring sleep opressed him, Displaid on ground, and seized euerie lim. Of trecherie or traines nought tooke he keep, But looslie on the grassie greene dispredd, His dearest life did trust to careles sleep; Which weighing down his drouping drowsie hedd, In quiet rest his molten heart did steep, Deuoid of care, and feare of all falsehedd: Had not inconstant fortune, bent to ill, 439 Bid strange mischance his quietnes to spill. For at his wonted time in that same place An huge great Serpent all with speckles pide, To drench himselfe in moorish slime did trace, There from the boyling heate himselfe to hide: He passing by with rolling wreathed pace, With brandisht tongue the emptie aire did gride, And wrapt his scalie boughts with fell despight, That all things seem'd appalled at his sight. Now more and more hauing himself enrolde, His glittering breast he lifteth vp on hie, And with proud vaunt his head aloft doth holde; His creste aboue spotted with purple die, On euerie side did shine like scalie golde, And his bright eyes glauncing full dreadfullie, Did seeme to flame out flakes of flashing fyre, And with sterne lookes to threaten kindled yre. Thus wise long time he did himselfe dispace There round about, when as at last he spide Lying along before him in that place, That flocks grand Captaine, and most trustie guide: Eftsoones more fierce in visage, and in pace, Throwing his firie eyes on euerie side, He commeth on, and all things in his way Full stearnly rends, that might his passage stay. Much he disdaines, that anie one should dare To come vnto his haunt; for which intent He inly burns, and gins straight to prepare The weapons, which Nature to him hath lent: Fellie he hisseth, and doth fiercely stare, And hath his iawes with angrie spirits rent, That all his tract with bloudie drops is stained, And all his foldes are now in length outstrained. Whom thus at point prepared, to preuent, A little noursling of the humid ayre, A Gnat vnto the sleepie Shepheard went, And marking where his ey-lids twinckling rare, 440 Shewd the two pearles, which sight vnto him lent, Through their thin couerings appearing fayre, His little needle there infixing deep, Warnd him awake, from death himselfe to keep. Wherewith enrag'd, he fiecely gan vpstart, And with his hand him rashly bruzing, slewe As in auengement of his heedles smart, That streight the sprite out of his senses flew, And life out of his members did depart: When suddenly casting aside his vew, He spide his foe with felonous intent, And feruent eyes to his destruction bent. All suddenly dismaid, and hartles quight, He fled abacke, and catching hastie holde Of a yong alder hard beside him pight, It rent, and streight about him gan beholde, What God or Fortune would assist his might. But whether God or Fortune made him bold Its hard to read: yet hardie will he had To ouercome, that made him lesse adrad. The scalie backe of that most hideous snake Enwrapped round, oft faining to retire, And oft him to assaile, he fiercely strake Whereas his temples did his creast front tyre; And for he was but slowe, did slowth off shake, And gazing ghastly on (for feare and yre Had blent so much his sense, that lesse he feard Yet when he saw him slaine, himself he cheard. By this the night forth from the darksome bowre Of Herebus her teemed steedes gan call, And laesie Vesper in his timelie howre From golden Oeta gan proceede withall; Whenas the Shepheard after this sharpe stowre, Seeing the doubled shadowes low to fall, Gathering his straying flocke, does homeward fare, And vnto rest his wearie ioynts prepare. Into whose sense so soone as lighter sleepe 441 Was entered, and now loosing euerie lim, Sweete slumbring deaw in carelessenesse did steepe, The Image of that Gnat appeard to him, And in sad tearmes gan sorrowfully weepe, With greislie countenaunce and visage grim, Wailing the wrong which he had done of late, In steed of good hastning his cruell fate. Said he, what haue I wretch deseru'd, that thus Into this bitter bale I am outcast, Whilest that thy life more deare and precious Was than mine owne, so long as it did last? I now in lieu of paines so gracious, am tost in th' ayre with euerie windie blast: Thou safe deliuered from sad decay, Thy careles limbs in loose sleep dost display. So liuest thou, but my poore wretched ghost Is forst to ferrie ouer Lethes Riuer, And spoyld of Charon too and fro am tost. Seest thou, how all places quake and quiuer Lightned with deadly lamps on euerie post? Tisiphone each where doth shake and shiuer Her flaming fire brond, encountring me, Whose lockes vncombed cruell adders be. And Cerberus, whose many mouthes doo bay, And barke out flames, as if on fire he fed; Adowne whose necke in terrible array, Ten thousand snakes cralling about his hed Doo hang in heapes, that horribly affray, And bloodie eyes do glister firie red; He oftentimes me dreadfullie doth threaten, With painfull torments to be sorely beaten. Ay me, that thankes so much should faile of meed, For that I thee restor'd to life againe, Euen from the doore of death and deadlie dreed. Where then is now the guerdon of my paine? Where the reward of my so piteous deed? The praise of pitie vanisht is in vaine, And th' antique faith of Iustice long agone 442 Out of the land is fled away and gone. I saw anothers fate approaching fast, And left mine owne his safetie to tender; Into the same mishap I now am cast, And shun'd destruction doth destruction render; Not vnto him that neuer hath trespast, But punishment is due to the offender. Yet long destruction be the punishment, So long as thankfull will may it relent. I carried am into waste wildernesse, Waste wildernes, amongst Cymerian shades, Where endles paines and hideous heauinesse Is round about me heapt in darksome glades. For there huge Othos sits in sad distresse, Fast bound with serpents that him oft inuades; Far of beholding Ephialtes tide, Which once assai'd to burne this world so wide. And there is mournfull Tityus mindefull yet Of thy displeasure, O Latona faire; Displeasure too implacable was it, That made him meat for wild foules of the ayre: Much do I feare among such fiends to sit; Much do I feare back to them to repayre, To the black shadowes of the Stygian shore, Where wretched ghosts sit wailing euermore. There next the vtmost brinck doth he abide, That did the bankets of the Gods bewray, Whose throat through thirst to nought nigh being dride His sense to seeke for ease turnes euery way: And he that in auengement of his pride, For scorning to the sacred Gods to pray, Against a mountaine rolls a mighty stone, Calling in vaine for rest, and can haue none. Go ye with them, go cursed damosells, Whose bridale torches foule Erynnis tynde, And Hymen at your Spousalls sad, foretells Tydings of death and massacre vnkinde: 443 With them that cruell Colchid mother dwells, The which conceiu'd in her reuengefull minde, With bitter woundes her owne deere babes to slay, And murdred troupes vpon great heapes to lay. There also those two Pandionian maides, Calling on Itis, Itis euermore, Whom wretched boy they slew with guiltie blades; For whome the Thracian king lamenting sore, Turn'd to a Lapwing, fowlie them vpbraydes, And fluttering round about them still does sore; There now they all eternally complaine Of others wrong, and suffer endles paine. But the two brethren borne of Cadmus blood, Whilst each does for the Soueraignty contend, Blinde through ambition, and with vengeance wood Each doth against the others bodie bend His cursed steele, of neither well withstood, And with wide wounds their carcases doth rend; That yet they both doe mortall foes remaine, Sith each with brothers bloudie hands was slaine. Ah (waladay) there is no end of paine, Nor chaunge of labour may intreated bee: Yet I beyond all these am carried faine, Where others powers farre different I see, And must passe ouer to th' Elisian plaine: There grim Persephone encountring mee, Doth vrge her fellowFuries earnestly, With their bright firebronds me to terrifie. There chast Alceste liues inuiolate, Free from all care, for that her husbands daies She did prolong by changing fate for fate, Lo there liues also the immortall praise Of womankinde, most faithfull to her mate, Penelope: and from her farre awayes A rulesse rout of yongmen, which her woo'd All slaine with darts, lie wallowed in their blood. And sad Eurydice thence now no more 444 Must turne to life, but there detained bee, For looking back, being forbid before: Yet was the guilt thereof, Orpheus, in thee. Bold sure he was, and worthie spirite bore, That durst those lowest shadowes goe to see, And could beleeue that anie thing could please Fell Cerberus, or Stygian powres appease. Ne feard the burning waues of Phlegeton, Nor those same mournfull kingdomes compassed With rustie horrour and fowle fashion, And deep digd vawtes, and Tartar couered With bloodie night, and darke confusion, And iudgement seates, whose Iudge is deadlie dred, A iudge, that after death doth punish sore The faults, which life hath trespassed before. But valiant fortune made Dan Orpheus bolde: For the swift running riuers still did stand, And the wilde beasts their furie did withhold, To follow Orpheus musicke through the land: And th' Okes deep grounded in the earthly molde Did moue, as if they could him vnderstand; And the shrill woods, which were of sense bereau'd, Through their hard barke his siluer sound receau'd. And eke the Moone her hastie steedes did stay, Drawing in teemes along the starrie skie, And didst (ô monthly Virgin) thou delay Thy nightly course, to heare his melodie? The same was able with like louely lay The Queene of hell to moue as easily, To yeeld Eurydice vnto her fere, Backe to be borne, though it vnlawfull were. She (Ladie) hauing well before approoued, The feends to be too cruell and seuere, Obseru'd th' appointed way, as her behooued, Ne euer did her ey-sight turne arere, Ne euer spake, ne cause of speaking mooued: But cruell Orpheus thou much crueller, Seeking to kisse her, brok'st the Gods decree, 445 And thereby mad'st her euer damn'd to be. Ah but sweete loue of pardon worthie is, And doth deserue to haue small faults remitted; If Hell at least things lightly done amis Knew how to pardon, when ought is omitted: Yet are ye both receiued into blis, And to the seates of happie soules admitted. And you, beside the honourable band Of great heroës doo in order stand. There be the two stout sonnes of Aeacus, Fierce Peleus, and the hardie Telamon. Both seeming now full glad and ioyeous Through their Syres dreadfull iurisdiction, Being the Iudge of all that horrid hous: And both of them by strange occasion, Renown'd in choyce of happie marriage Through Venus grace, and vertues cariage. For th'one was rauisht of his owne bondmaide, The faire Ixione captiu'd from Troy: But th' other was with Thetis loue assaid, Great Nereus his daughter, and his ioy. On this side them there is a yongman layd, Their match in glorie, mightie, fierce and coy; That from th' Argolick ships, with furious yre, Bett back the furie of the Troian fyre. O who would not recount the strong diuorces Of that great warre, which Troianes oft behelde, And oft beheld the warlike Greekish forces, When Teucrian soyle with bloodie riuers swelde, And wide Sigæan shores were spred with corses, And Simois and Xanthus blood out welde, Whilst Hector raged with outragious minde, Flames, weapons, wounds, in Greeks fleete to haue tynde. For Ida selfe, in ayde of that fierce fight, Out of her mountaines ministred supplies, And like a kindly nourse, did yeeld (for spight) Store of firebronds out of her nourseries, 446 Vnto her foster children that they might Inflame the Nauie of their enemies, And all the Rhætean shore to ashes turne, Where lay the ships, which they did seeke to burne. Gainst which the noble sonne of Telamon Opposd' himselfe, and thwarting his huge shield, Them battell bad, gainst whom appeard anon Hector, the glorie of the Troian field: Both fierce and furious in contention Encountred, that their mightie strokes so shrild, As the great clap of thunder, which doth ryue The ratling heauens, and cloudes asunder dryue. So th' one with fire and weapons did contend To cut the ships, from turning home againe To Argos, th' other stroue for to defend The force of Vulcane with his might and maine. Thus th'one Aecide did his fame extend: But th' other ioy'd, that on the Phrygian playne Hauing the blood of vanquisht Hector shedd, He compast Troy thrice with his bodie dedd. Againe great dole on either partie grewe, That him to death vnfaithfull Paris sent, And also him that false Vlysses slewe, Drawne into danger through close ambushment: Therefore from him Laërtes sonne his vewe Doth turne aside, and boasts his good euent In working of Strymonian Rhæsus fall, And efte in Dolonsslye surprysall. Againe the dreadfull Cycones him dismay, And blacke Læstrigones, a people stout: Then greedie Scilla, vnder whom there bay Manie great bandogs, which her gird about: Then doo the Aetnean Cyclops him affray, And deep Charybdis gulphing in and out: Lastly the squalid lakes of Tartarie, And griesly Feends of hell him terrifie. There also goodly Agamemnon bosts, 447 The glorie of the stock of Tantalus, And famous light of all the Greekish hosts, Vnder whose conduct most victorious, The Dorick flames consum'd the Iliack posts. Ah but the Greekes themselues more dolorous, To thee, ô Troy, paid penaunce for thy fall, In th' Hellespont being nigh drowned all. Well may appeare by proofe of their mischaunce, The chaungefull turning of mens slipperie state, That none, whom fortune freely doth aduaunce, Himselfe therefore to heauen should eleuate: For loftie type of honour through the glaunce Of enuies dart, is downe in dust prostrate; And all that vaunts in worldly vanitie, Shall fall through fortunes mutabilitie. Th' Argolicke power returning home againe, Enricht with spoyes of th' Ericthonian towre, Did happie winde and weather entertaine, And with good speed the fomie billowes scowre: No signe of storme, no feare of future paine, Which soone ensued them with heauie stowre. Nereïs to the Seas a token gaue, The whiles their crooked keeles the surges claue. Suddenly, whether through the Gods decree, Or haplesse rising of some froward starre, The heauens on euerie side enclowded bee: Black stormes and fogs are blowen vp from farre, That now the Pylote can no loadstarre see, But skies and seas doo make most dreadfull warre; The billowes striuing to the heauens to reach, And th' heauens striuing them for to impeach. And in auengement of their bold attempt, Both Sun and starres and all the heauenly powres Conspire in one to wreake their rash contempt, And downe on them to fall from highest towres: The skie in pieces seeming to be rent, Throwes lightning forth, & haile, & harmful showres That death on euerie side to them appeares 448 In thousand formes, to worke more ghastly feares. Some in the greedie flouds are sunke and drent, Some on the rocks of Caphareus are throwne; Some on th' Euboick Cliffs in pieces rent; Some scattred on the Hercæan shores vnknowne; And manie lost, of whom no moniment Remaines, nor memorie is to be showne: Whilst all the purchase of the Phrigian pray Tost on salt billowes, round about doth stray. Here manie other like Heroës bee, Equall in honour to the former crue, Whom ye in goodly seates may placed see, Descended all from Rome by linage due, From Rome, that holds the world in souereigntie, And doth all Nations vnto her subdue: Here Fabij and Decij doo dwell, Horatij that in vertue did excell. And here the antique fame of stout Camill Doth euer liue, and constant Curtius, Who stifly bent his vowed life to spill For Countreyes health, a gulph most hideous Amidst the Towne with his owne corps did fill, T' appease the powers; and prudent Mutius, Who in his flesh endur'd the scorching flame, To daunt his foe by ensample of the same. And here wise Curius, companion Of noble vertues, liues in endles rest; And stout Flaminius, whose deuotion Taught him the fires scorn'd furie to detest; And here the praise of either Scipion Abides in highest place aboue the best, To whom the ruin'd walls of Carthage vow'd, Trembling their forces, sound their praises lowd. Liue they for euer through their lasting praise: But I poore wretch am forced to retourne To the sad lakes, that Phoebus sunnie rayes 449 Doo neuer see, where soules doo alwaies mourne, And by the wayling shores to waste my dayes, Where Phlegeton with quenchles flames doth burne; By which iust Minos righteous soules doth seuer From wicked ones, to liue in blisse for euer. Me therefore thus the cruell fiends of hell Girt with long snakes, and thousand yron chaynes, Through doome of that their cruell Iudge, compell With bitter torture and impatient paines, Cause of my death, and iust complaint to tell. For thou art he, whom my poore ghost complaines To be the author of her ill vnwares, That careles hear'st my intollerable cares. Them therefore as bequeathing to the winde, I now depart, returning to thee neuer, And leaue this lamentable plaint behinde. But doo thou haunt the soft downe rolling riuer, And wilde greene woods, and fruitful pastures minde, And let the flitting aire my vaine words seuer. Thus hauing said, he heauily departed With piteous crie, that anie would haue smarted. Now, when the sloathful fit of lifes sweete rest Had left the heauie Shepheard, wondrous cares His inly grieued minde full sore opprest; That balefull sorrow he no longer beares, For that Gnats death, which deeply was imprest: But bends what euer power his aged yeares Him lent, yet being such, as through their might He lately slue his dreadfull foe in fight. By that same Riuer lurking vnder greene, Eftsoones he gins to fashion forth a place, And squaring it in compasse well beseene, There plotteth out a tombe by measured space: His yron headed spade tho making cleene, To dig vp sods out of the flowrie grasse, His worke he shortly to good purpose brought, Like as he had conceiu'd it in his thought. 450 An heape of earth he hoorded vp on hie, Enclosing it with banks on euerie side, And thereupon did raise full busily A little mount, of greene turffs edifide; And on the top of all, that passers by Might it behold, the toomb he did provide Of smoothest marble stone in order set, That neuer might his luckie scape forget. And round about he taught sweete flowres to growe, The Rose engrained in pure scarlet die, The Lilly fresh, and Violet belowe, The Marigolde, and cherefull Rosemarie, The Spartan Mirtle, whence sweet gumb does flowe, The purple Hyacinthe, and fresh Costmarie, And Saffron sought for in Cilician soyle, And Lawrell th' ornament of Phoebus toyle. Fresh Rhododaphne, and the Sabine flowre Matching the wealth of th' auncient Frankincence, And pallid Yuie, building of his owne bowre, And Box yet mindfull of his olde offence, Red Amaranthus, lucklesse Paramour, Oxeye still greene, and bitter Patience; Ne wants there pale Narcisse, that in a well Seeing his beautie, in loue with it fell, And whatsoeuer other flowre of worth, And whatso other hearb of louely hew The iouyous Spring out of the ground brings forth, To cloath her selfe in colours fresh and new; He planted there, and reard a mount of earth, In whose high front was writ as doth ensue. To thee, small Gnat, in lieu of his life saued, The Shepheard hath thy deaths record engraued. ~ Edmund Spenser

58: Book II: The Book of the Statesman Now from his cycle sleepless and vast round the dance of the earth-globe Gold Hyperion rose in the wake of the dawn like the eyeball Flaming of God revealed by his uplifted luminous eyelid. Troy he beheld and he viewed the transient labour of mortals. All her marble beauty and pomp were laid bare to the heavens. Sunlight streamed into Ilion waking the voice of her gardens, Amorous seized on her ways, lived glad in her plains and her pastures, Kissed her leaves into brightness of green. As a lover the last time Yearns to the beauty desired that again shall not wake to his kisses, So over Ilion doomed leaned the yearning immense of the sunrise. She like a wordless marble memory dreaming for ever Lifted the gaze of her perishable immortality sunwards. All her human past aspired in the clearness eternal, Temples of Phryx and Dardanus touched with the gold of the morning, Columns triumphant of Ilus, domes of their greatness enamoured, Stones that intended to live; and her citadel climbed up to heaven White like the soul of the Titan Laomedon claiming his kingdoms, Watched with alarm by the gods as he came. Her bosom maternal Thrilled to the steps of her sons and a murmur began in her high-roads. Life renewed its ways which death and sleep cannot alter, Life that pursuing her boundless march to a goal which we know not, Ever her own law obeys, not our hopes, who are slaves of her heart-beats. Then as now men walked in the round which the gods have decreed them Eagerly turning their eyes to the lure and the tool and the labour. Chained is their gaze to the span in front, to the gulfs they are blinded Meant for their steps. The seller opened his shop and the craftsman Bent oer his instruments handling the work he never would finish, Busy as if their lives were for ever, today in its evening Sure of tomorrow. The hammers clanged and the voice of the markets Waking desired its daily rumour. Nor only the craftsman, Only the hopes of the earth, but the hearts of her votaries kneeling Came to her marble shrines and upraised to our helpers eternal Missioned the prayer and the hymn or silent, subtly adoring Ventured upwards in incense. Loud too the clash of the cymbals Filled all the temples of Troy with the cry of our souls to the azure. Prayers breathed in vain and a cry that fell back with Fate for its answer! Children laughed in her doorways; joyous they played, by their mothers Smiled on still, but their tender bodies unknowing awaited Grecian spearpoints sharpened by Fate for their unripe bosoms, Tasks of the slave in Greece. Like bees round their honey-filled dwellings Murmuring swarmed to the well-heads the large-eyed daughters of Troya, Deep-bosomed, limbed like the gods,glad faces of old that were sentient Rapturous flowers of the soul, bright bodies that lived under darkness Nobly massed of their locks like day under night made resplendent, Daughters divine of the earth in the ages when heaven was our father. They round Troys well-heads flowerlike satisfied morn with their beauty Or in the river baring their knees to the embrace of the coolness Dipped their white feet in the clutch of his streams, in the haste of Scamander, Lingering this last time with laughter and talk of the day and the morrow Leaned to the hurrying flood. All his swiftnesses raced down to meet them, Crowding his channel with dancing billows and turbulent murmurs. Xanthus primaeval met these waves of our life in its passing Even as of old he had played with Troys ancient fair generations Mingling his deathless voice with the laughter and joy of their ages, Laughter of dawns that are dead and a joy that the earth has rejected. Still his whispering trees remembered their bygone voices. Hast thou forgotten, O river of Troy? Still, still we can hear them Now, if we listen long in our souls, the bygone voices. Earth in her fibres remembers, the breezes are stored with our echoes. Over the stone-hewn steps for their limpid orient waters Joyous they leaned and they knew not yet of the wells of Mycenae, Drew not yet from Eurotas the jar for an alien master, Mixed not Peneus yet with their tears. From the clasp of the current Now in their groups they arose and dispersed through the streets and the byways, Turned from the freedom of earth to the works and the joy of the hearthside, Lightly they rose and returned through the lanes of the wind-haunted city Swaying with rhythmical steps while the anklets jangled and murmured. Silent temples saw them passing; you too, O houses Built with such hopes by mortal man for his transient lodging; Fragrant the gardens strewed on dark tresses their white-smiling jasmines Dropped like a silent boon of purity soft from the branches: Flowers by the wayside were budding, cries flew winged round the tree-tops. Bright was the glory of life in Ilion city of Priam. Thrice to the city the doom-blast published its solemn alarum; Blast of the trumpets that call to assembly clamoured through Troya Thrice and were still. From garden and highway, from palace and temple Turned like a steed to the trumpet, rejoicing in war and ambition, Gathered alert to the call the democracy hated of heaven. First in their ranks upbearing their age as Atlas his heavens, Eagle-crested, with hoary hair like the snow upon Ida, Ilions senators paced, Antenor and wide-browed Anchises, Athamas famous for ships and the war of the waters, Tryas Still whose name was remembered by Oxus the orient river, Astyoches and Ucalegon, dateless Pallachus, Aetor, Aspetus who of the secrets divine knew all and was silent, Ascanus, Iliones, Alcesiphron, Orus, Aretes. Next from the citadel came with the voice of the heralds before him Priam and Priams sons, Aeneas leonine striding, Followed by the heart of a nation adoring her Penthesilea. All that was noble in Troy attended the regal procession Marching in front and behind and the tramp of their feet was a rhythm Tuned to the arrogant fortunes of Ilion ruled by incarnate Demigods, Ilus and Phryx and Dardanus, Tros of the conquests, Tros and far-ruling Laomedon who to his souls strong labour Drew down the sons of the skies and was served by the ageless immortals. Into the agora vast and aspirant besieged by its columns Bathed and anointed they came like gods in their beauty and grandeur. Last like the roar of the winds came trampling the surge of the people. Clamorous led by a force obscure to its ultimate fatal Session of wrath the violent mighty democracy hastened; Thousands of ardent lives with the heart yet unslain in their bosoms Lifted to heaven the voice of man and his far-spreading rumour. Singing the young men with banners marched in their joyous processions, Trod in martial measure or dancing with lyrical paces Chanted the glory of Troy and the wonderful deeds of their fathers. Into the columned assembly where Ilus had gathered his people, Thousands on thousands the tramp and the murmur poured; in their armoured Glittering tribes they were ranked, an untameable high-hearted nation Waiting the voice of its chiefs. Some gazed on the greatness of Priam Ancient, remote from their days, the last of the gods who were passing, Left like a soul uncompanioned in worlds where his strength shall not conquer: Sole like a column gigantic alone on a desolate hill-side Older than mortals he seemed and mightier. Many in anger Aimed their hostile looks where calm though by heaven abandoned, Left to his soul and his lucid mind and its thoughts unavailing, Leading the age-chilled few whom the might of their hearts had not blinded, Famous Antenor was seated, the fallen unpopular statesman, Wisest of speakers in Troy but rejected, stoned and dishonoured. Silent, aloof from the people he sat, a heart full of ruins. Low was the rumour that swelled like the hum of the bees in a meadow When with the thirst of the honey they swarm on the thyme and the linden, Hundreds humming and flitting till all that place is a murmur. Then from his seat like a tower arising Priam the monarch Slowly erect in his vast tranquillity silenced the people: Lonely, august he stood like one whom death has forgotten, Reared like a column of might and of silence over the assembly. So Olympus rises alone with his snows into heaven. Crowned were his heights by the locks that swept like the mass of the snow-swathe Clothing his giant shoulders; his eyes of deep meditation, Eyes that beheld now the end and accepted it like the beginning Gazed on the throng of the people as on a pomp that is painted: Slowly he spoke like one who is far from the scenes where he sojourns. Leader of Ilion, hero Deiphobus, thou who hast summoned Troy in her people, arise; say wherefore thou callest us. Evil Speak thou or good, thou canst speak that only: Necessity fashions All that the unseen eye has beheld. Speak then to the Trojans; Say on this dawn of her making what issue of death or of triumph Fate in her suddenness puts to the unseeing, what summons to perish Send to this nation men who revolt and gods who are hostile. Rising Deiphobus spoke, in stature less than his father, Less in his build, yet the mightiest man and tallest whom coursers Bore or his feet to the fight since Ajax fell by the Xanthus. People of Ilion, long have you fought with the gods and the Argives Slaying and slain, but the years persist and the struggle is endless. Fainting your helpers cease from the battle, the nations forsake you. Asia weary of strenuous greatness, ease-enamoured Suffers the foot of the Greek to tread on the beaches of Troas. Yet have we striven for Troy and for Asia, men who desert us. Not for ourselves alone have we fought, for our life of a moment! Once if the Greeks were triumphant, once if their nations were marshalled Under some far-seeing chief, Odysseus, Peleus, Achilles, Not on the banks of Scamander and skirts of the azure Aegean Fainting would cease the audacious emprise, the Titanic endeavour; Tigris would flee from their tread and Indus be drunk by their coursers. Now in these days when each sun goes marvelling down that Troy stands yet Suffering, smiting, alive, though doomed to all eyes that behold her, Flinging back Death from her walls and bronze to the shock and the clamour, Driven by a thought that has risen in the dawn from the tents on the beaches Grey Talthybius chariot waits in the Ilian portals, Voice of the Hellene demigod challenges timeless Troya. Thus has he said to us: Know you not Doom when she walks in your heavens? Feelst thou not then thy set, O sun who illuminedst Nature? Stripped of helpers you stand alone against Doom and Achilles, Left by the earth that served you, by heaven that helped you rejected: Death insists at your gates and the flame and the sword are impatient. None can escape the wheel of the gods and its vast revolutions! Fate demands the joy and pride of the earth for the Argive, Asias wealth for the lust of the young barbarian nations. City divine, whose fame overroofed like heaven the nations, Sink eclipsed in the circle vast of my radiance; Troya, Joined to my northern realms deliver the East to the Hellene; Ilion, to Hellas be yoked; wide Asia, fringe thou Peneus. Lay down golden Helen, a sacrifice lovely and priceless Cast by your weakness and fall on immense Necessitys altar; Yield to my longing Polyxena, Hecubas deep-bosomed daughter, Her whom my heart desires. She shall leave with you peace and her healing Joy of mornings secure and death repulsed from your hearthsides. Yield these and live, else I leap on you, Fate in front, Hades behind me. Bound to the gods by an oath I return not again from the battle Till from high Ida my shadow extends to the Mede and Euphrates. Let not your victories deceive you, steps that defeat has imagined; Hear not the voice of your heroes; their fame is a trumpet in Hades: Only they conquer while yet my horses champ free in their stables. Earth cannot long resist the man whom Heaven has chosen; Gods with him walk; his chariot is led; his arm is assisted. High rings the Hellene challenge, earth waits for the Ilian answer. Always mans Fate hangs poised on the flitting breath of a moment; Called by some word, by some gesture it leaps, then tis graven, tis granite. Speak! by what gesture high shall the stern gods recognise Troya? Sons of the ancients, race of the gods, inviolate city, Firmer my spear shall I grasp or cast from my hand and for ever? Search in your hearts if your fathers still dwell in them, children of Teucer. So Deiphobus spoke and the nation heard him in silence, Awed by the shadow vast of doom, indignant with Fortune. Calm from his seat Antenor arose as a wrestler arises, Tamer of beasts in the cage of the lions, eyeing the monsters Brilliant, tawny of mane, and he knows if his courage waver, Falter his eye or his nerve be surprised by the gods that are hostile, Death will leap on him there in the crowded helpless arena. Fearless Antenor arose, and a murmur swelled in the meeting Cruel and threatening, hoarse like the voice of the sea upon boulders; Hisses thrilled through the roar and one man cried to another, Lo he will speak of peace who has swallowed the gold of Achaia! Surely the people of Troy are eunuchs who suffer Antenor Rising unharmed in the agora. Are there not stones in the city? Surely the steel grows dear in the land when a traitor can flourish. Calm like a god or a summit Antenor stood in the uproar. But as he gazed on his soul came memory dimming the vision; For he beheld his past and the agora crowded and cheering, Passionate, full of delight while Antenor spoke to the people, Troy that he loved and his fatherl and proud of her eloquent statesman. Tears to his eyes came thick and he gripped at the staff he was holding. Mounting his eyes met fully the tumult, mournful and thrilling, Conquering mens hearts with a note of doom in its sorrowful sweetness. People of Ilion, blood of my blood, O race of Antenor, Once will I speak though you slay me; for who would shrink from destruction Knowing that soon of his city and nation, his house and his dear ones All that remains will be a couch of trampled ashes? Athene, Slain today may I join the victorious souls of our fathers, Not for the anguish be kept and the irremediable weeping. Loud will I speak the word that the gods have breathed in my spirit, Strive this last time to save the death-destined. Who are these clamour Hear him not, gold of the Greeks bought his words and his throat is accursd? Troy whom my counsels made great, hast thou heard this roar of their frenzy Tearing thy ancient bosom? Is it thy voice, heaven-abandoned, my mother? O my country, O my creatress, earth of my longings! Earth where our fathers lie in their sacred ashes undying, Memoried temples shelter the shrines of our gods and the altars Pure where we worshipped, the beautiful children smile on us passing, Women divine and the men of our nation! O land where our childhood Played at a mothers feet mid the trees and the hills of our country, Hoping our manhood toiled and our youth had its seekings for godhead, Thou for our age keepst repose mid the love and the honour of kinsmen, Silent our relics shall lie with the city guarding our ashes! Earth who hast fostered our parents, earth who hast given us our offspring, Soil that created our race where fed from the bosom of Nature Happy our children shall dwell in the storied homes of their fathers, Souls that our souls have stamped, sweet forms of ourselves when we perish! Once even then have they seen thee in their hearts, or dreamed of thee ever Who from thy spirit revolt and only thy name make an idol Hating thy faithful sons and the cult of thy ancient ideal! Wake, O my mother divine, remember thy gods and thy wisdom, Silence the tongues that degrade thee, prophets profane of thy godhead. Madmen, to think that a man who has offered his life for his country, Served her with words and deeds and adored with victories and triumphs Ever could think of enslaving her breast to the heel of a foeman! Surely Antenors halls are empty, he begs from the stranger Leading his sons and his childrens sons by the hand in the market Showing his rags since his need is so bitter of gold from the Argives! You who demand a reply when Laocoon lessens Antenor, Hush then your feeble roar and your ear to the past and the distance Turn. You fields that are famous for ever, reply for me calling, Fields of the mighty mown by my swords edge, Chersonese conquered, Thrace and her snows where we fought on the frozen streams and were victors Then when they were unborn who are now your delight and your leaders. Answer return, you columns of Ilus, here where my counsels Made Troy mightier guiding her safe through the shocks of her foemen. Gold! I have heaped it up high, I am rich with the spoils of your haters. It was your fathers dead who gave me that wealth as my guerdon, Now my reproach, your fathers who saw not the Greeks round their ramparts: They were not cooped by an upstart race in the walls of Apollo, Saw not Hector slain and Troilus dragged by his coursers. Far over wrathful Jaxartes they rode; the shaken Achaian Prostrate adored your strength who now shouts at your portals and conquers Then when Antenor guided Troy, this old man, this traitor, Not Laocoon, nay, not even Paris nor Hector. But I have changed, I have grown a niggard of blood and of treasure, Selfish, chilled as old men seem to the young and the headstrong, Counselling safety and ease, not the ardour of noble decisions. Come to my house and behold, my house that was filled once with voices. Sons whom the high gods envied me crowded the halls that are silent. Where are they now? They are dead, their voices are silent in Hades, Fallen slaying the foe in a war between sin and the Furies. Silent they went to the battle to die unmourned for their country, Die as they knew in vain. Do I keep now the last ones remaining, Sparing their blood that my house may endure? Is there any in Troya Speeds to the front of the mellay outstripping the sons of Antenor? Let him arise and speak and proclaim it and bid me be silent. Heavy is this war that you love on my heart and I hold you as madmen Doomed by the gods, abandoned by Pallas, by Hera afflicted. Who would not hate to behold his work undone by the foolish? Who would not weep if he saw Laocoon ruining Troya, Paris doomed in his beauty, Aeneas slain by his valour? Still you need to be taught that the high gods see and remember, Dream that they care not if justice be done on the earth or oppression! Happy to live, aspire while you violate man and the immortals! Vainly the sands of Time have been strewn with the ruins of empires, Signs that the gods had left, but in vain. For they look for a nation, One that can conquer itself having conquered the world, but they find none. None has been able to hold all the gods in his bosom unstaggered, All have grown drunken with force and have gone down to Hell and to Ate. All have been thrust from their heights, say the fools; we shall live and for ever. We are the people at last, the children, the favourites; all things Only to us are permitted. They too descend to the silence, Death receives their hopes and the void their stirrings of action. Eviller fate there is none than life too long among mortals. I have conversed with the great who have gone, I have fought in their war-cars; Tros I have seen, Laomedons hand has dwelt on my temples. Now I behold Laocoon, now our greatest is Paris. First when Phryx by the Hellespont reared to the cry of the ocean Hewing her stones as vast as his thoughts his high-seated fortress, Planned he a lair for a beast of prey, for a pantheress dire-souled Crouched in the hills for her bound or self-gathered against the avenger? Dardanus shepherded Asias coasts and her sapphire-girt islands. Mild was his rule like the blessing of rain upon fields in the summer. Gladly the harried coasts reposed confessing the Phrygian, Caria, Lycias kings and the Paphlagon, strength of the Mysian; Minos Crete recovered the sceptre of old Rhadamanthus. Ilus and Tros had strength in the fight like a far-striding Titans: Troy triumphant following the urge of their souls to the vastness, Helmeted, crowned like a queen of the gods with the fates for her coursers Rode through the driving sleet of the spears to Indus and Oxus. Then twice over she conquered the vanquished, with peace as in battle; There where discord had clashed, sweet Peace sat girded with plenty, There where tyranny counted her blows, came the hands of a father. Neither had Teucer a soul like your chiefs who refounded this nation. Such was the antique and noble tradition of Troy in her founders, Builders of power that endured; but it perishes lost to their offspring, Trampled, scorned by an arrogant age, by a violent nation. Strong Anchises trod it down trampling victorious onwards Stern as his sword and hard as the silent bronze of his armour. More than another I praise the man who is mighty and steadfast, Even as Ida the mountain I praise, a refuge for lions; But in the council I laud him not, he who a god for his kindred, Lives for the rest without bowels of pity or fellowship, lone-souled, Scorning the world that he rules, who untamed by the weight of an empire Holds allies as subjects, subjects as slaves and drives to the battle Careless more of their wills than the coursers yoked to his war-car. Therefore they fought while they feared, but gladly abandon us falling. Yet had they gathered to Teucer in the evil days of our nation. Where are they now? Do they gather then to the dreaded Anchises? Or has Aeneas helped with his counsels hateful to wisdom? Hateful is this, abhorred of the gods, imagined by Ate When against subjects murmuring discord and faction appointed Scatter unblest gold, the heart of a people is poisoned, Virtue pursued and baseness triumphs tongued like a harlot, Brother against brother arrayed that the rule may endure of a stranger. Yes, but it lasts! For its hour. The high gods watch in their silence, Mute they endure for a while that the doom may be swifter and greater. Hast thou then lasted, O Troy? Lo, the Greeks at thy gates and Achilles. Dream, when Virtue departs, that Wisdom will linger, her sister! Wisdom has turned from your hearts; shall Fortune dwell with the foolish? Fatal oracles came to you great-tongued, vaunting of empires Stretched from the risen sun to his rest in the occident waters, Dreams of a city throned on the hills with her foot on the nations. Meanwhile the sword was prepared for our breasts and the flame for our housetops. Wake, awake, O my people! the fire-brand mounts up your doorsteps; Gods who deceived to slay, press swords on your childrens bosoms. See, O ye blind, ere death in pale countries open your eyelids! Hear, O ye deaf, the sounds in your ears and the voices of evening! Young men who vaunt in your strength! when the voice of this aged Antenor Governed your fathers youth, all the Orient was joined to our banners. Macedon leaned to the East and her princes yearned to the victor, Scythians worshipped in Ilions shrines, the Phoenician trader Bartered her tokens, Babylons wise men paused at our thresholds; Fair-haired sons of the snows came rapt towards golden Troya Drawn by the song and the glory. Strymon sang hymns unto Ida, Hoarse Chalcidice, dim Chersonesus married their waters Under the oerarching yoke of Troy twixt the term-posts of Ocean. Meanwhile far through the world your fortunes led by my counsels Followed their lure like women snared by a magical tempter: High was their chant as they paced and it came from continents distant. Turn now and hear! what voice approaches? what glitter of armies? Loud upon Trojan beaches the tread and the murmur of Hellas! Hark! tis the Achaians paean rings oer the Pergaman waters! So wake the dreams of Aeneas; reaped is Laocoons harvest. Artisans new of your destiny fashioned this far-spreading downfall, Counsellors blind who scattered your strength to the hooves of the Scythian, Barren victories, trophies of skin-clad Illyrian pastors. Who but the fool and improvident, who but the dreamer and madman Leaves for the far and ungrasped earths close and provident labour? Children of earth, our mother gives tokens, she lays down her signposts, Step by step to advance on her bosom, to grow by her seasons, Order our works by her patience and limit our thought by her spaces. But you had chiefs who were demigods, souls of an earth-scorning stature, Minds that saw vaster than life and strengths that Gods hour could not limit! These men seized upon Troy as the tool of their giant visions, Dreaming of Africas suns and bright Hesperian orchards, Carthage our mart and our feet on the sunset hills of the Latins. Ilions hinds in the dream ploughed Libya, sowed Italys cornfields, Troy stretched to Gades; even the gods and the Fates had grown Trojan. So are the natures of men uplifted by Heaven in its satire. Scorning the bit of the gods, despisers of justice and measure, Zeus is denied and adored some shadow huge of their natures Losing the shape of man in a dream that is splendid and monstrous. Titans, vaunting they stride and the world resounds with their footsteps; Titans, clanging they fall and the world is full of their ruin. Children, you dreamed with them, heard the roar of the Atlantic breakers Welcome your keels and the Isles of the Blest grew your wonderful gardens. Lulled in the dream, you saw not the black-drifting march of the storm-rack, Heard not the galloping wolves of the doom and the howl of their hunger. Greece in her peril united her jarring clans; you suffered Patient, preparing the north, the wisdom and silence of Peleus, Atreus craft and the Argives gathered to King Agamemnon. But there were prophecies, Pythian oracles, mutterings from Delphi. How shall they prosper who haste after auguries, oracles, whispers, Dreams that walk in the night and voices obscure of the silence? Touches are these from the gods that bewilder the brain to its ruin. One sole oracle helps, still armoured in courage and prudence Patient and heedful to toil at the work that is near in the daylight. Leave to the night its phantoms, leave to the future its curtain! Only today Heaven gave to mortal man for his labour. If thou hadst bowed not thy mane, O Troy, to the child and the dreamer, Hadst thou been faithful to Wisdom the counsellor seated and ancient, Then would the hour not have dawned when Paris lingered in Sparta Led by the goddess fatal and beautiful, white Aphrodite. Man, shun the impulses dire that spring armed from thy natures abysms! Dread the dusk rose of the gods, flee the honey that tempts from its petals! Therefore the black deed was done and the hearth that welcomed was sullied. Sin-called the Fury uplifted her tresses of gloom oer the nations Maddening the earth with the scream of her blood-thirst, bowelless, stone-eyed, Claiming her victims from God and bestriding the hate and the clamour. Yet midst the stroke and the wail when mens eyes were blind with the blood-mist, Still had the high gods mercy recalling Teucer and Ilus. Just was the heart of their anger. Discord flaming from Ida, Hundred-voiced glared from the ships through the camp of the victor Achaians, Love to that discord added her flowerlike lips of Briseis; Faltering lids of Polyxena conquered the strength of Pelides. Vainly the gods who pity open the gates of salvation! Vainly the winds of their mercy brea the on our fevered existence! Man his passions prefers to the voice that guides from the heavens. These too were here whom Hera had chosen to ruin this nation: Charioteers cracking the whips of their speed on the paths of destruction, Demigods they! they have come down from Heaven glad to that labour, Deaf is the world with the fame of their wheels as they race down to Hades. O that alone they could reach it! O that pity could soften Harsh Necessitys dealings, sparing our innocent children, Saving the Trojan women and aged from bonds and the sword-edge! These had not sinned whom you slay in your madness! Ruthless, O mortals, Must you be then to yourselves when the gods even faltering with pity Turn from the grief that must come and the agony vast and the weeping? Say not the road of escape sinks too low for your arrogant treading. Pride is not for our clay; the earth, not heaven was our mother And we are even as the ant in our toil and the beast in our dying; Only who cling to the hands of the gods can rise up from the earth-mire. Children, lie prone to their scourge, that your hearts may revive in their sunshine. This is our lot! when the anger of heaven has passed then the mortal Raises his head; soon he heals his heart and forgets he has suffered. Yet if resurgence from weakness and shame were withheld from the creature, Every fall without morrow, who then would counsel submission? But since the height of mortal fortune ascending must stumble, Fallen, again ascend, since death like birth is our portion, Ripening, mowed, to be sown again like corn by the farmer, Let us be patient still with the gods accepting their purpose. Deem not defeat I welcome. Think not to Hellas submitting Death of proud hope I would seal. Not this have I counselled, O nation, But to be even as your high-crested forefa thers, greatest of mortals. Troya of old enringed by the hooves of Cimmerian armies Flamed to the heavens from her plains and her smoke-blackened citadel sheltered Mutely the joyless rest of her sons and the wreck of her greatness. Courage and wisdom survived in that fall and a stern-eyed prudence Helped her to live; disguised from her mightiness Troy crouched waiting. Teucer descended whose genius worked at this kingdom and nation, Patient, scrupulous, wise, like a craftsman carefully toiling Over a helmet or over a breastplate, testing it always, Toiled in the eye of the Masters of all and had heed of its labour. So in the end they would not release him like souls that are common; They out of Ida sent into Ilion Pallas Athene; Secret she came and he went with her into the luminous silence. Teucers children after their sire completed his labour. Now too, O people, front adversity self-gathered, silent. Veil thyself, leonine mighty Ilion, hiding thy greatness! Be as thy father Teucer; be as a cavern for lions; Be as a Fate that crouches! Wordless and stern for your vengeance Self-gathered work in the night and secrecy shrouding your bosoms. Let not the dire heavens know of it; let not the foe seize a whisper! Ripen the hour of your stroke, while your words drip sweeter than honey. Sure am I, friends, you will turn from death at my voice, you will hear me! Some day yet I shall gaze on the ruins of haughty Mycenae. Is this not better than Ilion cast to the sword of her haters, Is this not happier than Troya captured and wretchedly burning, Time to await in his stride when the southern and northern Achaians Gazing with dull distaste now over their severing isthmus Hate-filled shall move to the shock by the spur of the gods in them driven, Pelops march upon Attica, Thebes descend on the Spartan? Then shall the hour now kept in heaven for us ripen to dawning, Then shall Victory cry to our banners over the Ocean Calling our sons with her voice immortal. Children of Ilus, Then shall Troy rise in her strength and stride over Greece up to Gades. So Antenor spoke and the mind of the hostile assembly Moved and swayed with his words like the waters ruled by Poseidon. Even as the billows rebellious lashed by the whips of the tempest Curvet and rear their crests like the hooded wrath of a serpent, Green-eyed under their cowls sublime,unwilling they journey, Foam-bannered, hoarse-voiced, shepherded, forced by the wind to the margin Meant for their rest and can turn not at all, though they rage, on their driver, Last with a sullen applause and consenting lapse into thunder, Where they were led all the while they sink down huge and astonished, So in their souls that withstood and obeyed and hated the yielding, Lashed by his censure, indignant, the Trojans moved towards his purpose: Sometimes a roar arose, then only, weakened, rarer, Angry murmurs swelled between sullen stretches of silence; Last, a reluctant applause broke dull from the throats of the commons. Silent raged in their hearts Laocoons following daunted; Troubled the faction of Paris turned to the face of their leader. He as yet rose not; careless he sat in his beauty and smiling, Gazing with brilliant eyes at the sculptured pillars of Ilus. Doubtful, swayed by Antenor, waited in silence the nation. *** ~ Sri Aurobindo, 2 - The Book of the Statesman

59:A thing of beauty is a joy for ever: Its loveliness increases; it will never Pass into nothingness; but still will keep A bower quiet for us, and a sleep Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing. Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing A flowery band to bind us to the earth, Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth Of noble natures, of the gloomy days, Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkened ways Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all, Some shape of beauty moves away the pall From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon, Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon For simple sheep; and such are daffodils With the green world they live in; and clear rills That for themselves a cooling covert make 'Gainst the hot season; the mid forest brake, Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms: And such too is the grandeur of the dooms We have imagined for the mighty dead; All lovely tales that we have heard or read: An endless fountain of immortal drink, Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink. Nor do we merely feel these essences For one short hour; no, even as the trees That whisper round a temple become soon Dear as the temple's self, so does the moon, The passion poesy, glories infinite, Haunt us till they become a cheering light Unto our souls, and bound to us so fast, That, whether there be shine, or gloom o'ercast, They alway must be with us, or we die. Therefore, 'tis with full happiness that I Will trace the story of Endymion. The very music of the name has gone Into my being, and each pleasant scene Is growing fresh before me as the green Of our own vallies: so I will begin Now while I cannot hear the city's din; Now while the early budders are just new, And run in mazes of the youngest hue About old forests; while the willow trails Its delicate amber; and the dairy pails Bring home increase of milk. And, as the year Grows lush in juicy stalks, I'll smoothly steer My little boat, for many quiet hours, With streams that deepen freshly into bowers. Many and many a verse I hope to write, Before the daisies, vermeil rimm'd and white, Hide in deep herbage; and ere yet the bees Hum about globes of clover and sweet peas, I must be near the middle of my story. O may no wintry season, bare and hoary, See it half finished: but let Autumn bold, With universal tinge of sober gold, Be all about me when I make an end. And now at once, adventuresome, I send My herald thought into a wilderness: There let its trumpet blow, and quickly dress My uncertain path with green, that I may speed Easily onward, thorough flowers and weed. Upon the sides of Latmos was outspread A mighty forest; for the moist earth fed So plenteously all weed-hidden roots Into o'er-hanging boughs, and precious fruits. And it had gloomy shades, sequestered deep, Where no man went; and if from shepherd's keep A lamb strayed far a-down those inmost glens, Never again saw he the happy pens Whither his brethren, bleating with content, Over the hills at every nightfall went. Among the shepherds, 'twas believed ever, That not one fleecy lamb which thus did sever From the white flock, but pass'd unworried By angry wolf, or pard with prying head, Until it came to some unfooted plains Where fed the herds of Pan: ay great his gains Who thus one lamb did lose. Paths there were many, Winding through palmy fern, and rushes fenny, And ivy banks; all leading pleasantly To a wide lawn, whence one could only see Stems thronging all around between the swell Of turf and slanting branches: who could tell The freshness of the space of heaven above, Edg'd round with dark tree tops? through which a dove Would often beat its wings, and often too A little cloud would move across the blue. Full in the middle of this pleasantness There stood a marble altar, with a tress Of flowers budded newly; and the dew Had taken fairy phantasies to strew Daisies upon the sacred sward last eve, And so the dawned light in pomp receive. For 'twas the morn: Apollo's upward fire Made every eastern cloud a silvery pyre Of brightness so unsullied, that therein A melancholy spirit well might win Oblivion, and melt out his essence fine Into the winds: rain-scented eglantine Gave temperate sweets to that well-wooing sun; The lark was lost in him; cold springs had run To warm their chilliest bubbles in the grass; Man's voice was on the mountains; and the mass Of nature's lives and wonders puls'd tenfold, To feel this sun-rise and its glories old. Now while the silent workings of the dawn Were busiest, into that self-same lawn All suddenly, with joyful cries, there sped A troop of little children garlanded; Who gathering round the altar, seemed to pry Earnestly round as wishing to espy Some folk of holiday: nor had they waited For many moments, ere their ears were sated With a faint breath of music, which ev'n then Fill'd out its voice, and died away again. Within a little space again it gave Its airy swellings, with a gentle wave, To light-hung leaves, in smoothest echoes breaking Through copse-clad vallies,ere their death, oer-taking The surgy murmurs of the lonely sea. And now, as deep into the wood as we Might mark a lynx's eye, there glimmered light Fair faces and a rush of garments white, Plainer and plainer shewing, till at last Into the widest alley they all past, Making directly for the woodland altar. O kindly muse! let not my weak tongue faulter In telling of this goodly company, Of their old piety, and of their glee: But let a portion of ethereal dew Fall on my head, and presently unmew My soul; that I may dare, in wayfaring, To stammer where old Chaucer used to sing. Leading the way, young damsels danced along, Bearing the burden of a shepherd song; Each having a white wicker over brimm'd With April's tender younglings: next, well trimm'd, A crowd of shepherds with as sunburnt looks As may be read of in Arcadian books; Such as sat listening round Apollo's pipe, When the great deity, for earth too ripe, Let his divinity o'er-flowing die In music, through the vales of Thessaly: Some idly trailed their sheep-hooks on the ground, And some kept up a shrilly mellow sound With ebon-tipped flutes: close after these, Now coming from beneath the forest trees, A venerable priest full soberly, Begirt with ministring looks: alway his eye Stedfast upon the matted turf he kept, And after him his sacred vestments swept. From his right hand there swung a vase, milk-white, Of mingled wine, out-sparkling generous light; And in his left he held a basket full Of all sweet herbs that searching eye could cull: Wild thyme, and valley-lilies whiter still Than Leda's love, and cresses from the rill. His aged head, crowned with beechen wreath, Seem'd like a poll of ivy in the teeth Of winter hoar. Then came another crowd Of shepherds, lifting in due time aloud Their share of the ditty. After them appear'd, Up-followed by a multitude that rear'd Their voices to the clouds, a fair wrought car, Easily rolling so as scarce to mar The freedom of three steeds of dapple brown: Who stood therein did seem of great renown Among the throng. His youth was fully blown, Shewing like Ganymede to manhood grown; And, for those simple times, his garments were A chieftain king's: beneath his breast, half bare, Was hung a silver bugle, and between His nervy knees there lay a boar-spear keen. A smile was on his countenance; he seem'd, To common lookers on, like one who dream'd Of idleness in groves Elysian: But there were some who feelingly could scan A lurking trouble in his nether lip, And see that oftentimes the reins would slip Through his forgotten hands: then would they sigh, And think of yellow leaves, of owlets cry, Of logs piled solemnly.Ah, well-a-day, Why should our young Endymion pine away! Soon the assembly, in a circle rang'd, Stood silent round the shrine: each look was chang'd To sudden veneration: women meek Beckon'd their sons to silence; while each cheek Of virgin bloom paled gently for slight fear. Endymion too, without a forest peer, Stood, wan, and pale, and with an awed face, Among his brothers of the mountain chase. In midst of all, the venerable priest Eyed them with joy from greatest to the least, And, after lifting up his aged hands, Thus spake he: "Men of Latmos! shepherd bands! Whose care it is to guard a thousand flocks: Whether descended from beneath the rocks That overtop your mountains; whether come From vallies where the pipe is never dumb; Or from your swelling downs, where sweet air stirs Blue hare-bells lightly, and where prickly furze Buds lavish gold; or ye, whose precious charge Nibble their fill at ocean's very marge, Whose mellow reeds are touch'd with sounds forlorn By the dim echoes of old Triton's horn: Mothers and wives! who day by day prepare The scrip, with needments, for the mountain air; And all ye gentle girls who foster up Udderless lambs, and in a little cup Will put choice honey for a favoured youth: Yea, every one attend! for in good truth Our vows are wanting to our great god Pan. Are not our lowing heifers sleeker than Night-swollen mushrooms? Are not our wide plains Speckled with countless fleeces? Have not rains Green'd over April's lap? No howling sad Sickens our fearful ewes; and we have had Great bounty from Endymion our lord. The earth is glad: the merry lark has pour'd His early song against yon breezy sky, That spreads so clear o'er our solemnity." Thus ending, on the shrine he heap'd a spire Of teeming sweets, enkindling sacred fire; Anon he stain'd the thick and spongy sod With wine, in honour of the shepherd-god. Now while the earth was drinking it, and while Bay leaves were crackling in the fragrant pile, And gummy frankincense was sparkling bright 'Neath smothering parsley, and a hazy light Spread greyly eastward, thus a chorus sang: "O THOU, whose mighty palace roof doth hang From jagged trunks, and overshadoweth Eternal whispers, glooms, the birth, life, death Of unseen flowers in heavy peacefulness; Who lov'st to see the hamadryads dress Their ruffled locks where meeting hazels darken; And through whole solemn hours dost sit, and hearken The dreary melody of bedded reeds In desolate places, where dank moisture breeds The pipy hemlock to strange overgrowth; Bethinking thee, how melancholy loth Thou wast to lose fair Syrinxdo thou now, By thy love's milky brow! By all the trembling mazes that she ran, Hear us, great Pan! "O thou, for whose soul-soothing quiet, turtles Passion their voices cooingly 'mong myrtles, What time thou wanderest at eventide Through sunny meadows, that outskirt the side Of thine enmossed realms: O thou, to whom Broad leaved fig trees even now foredoom Their ripen'd fruitage; yellow girted bees Their golden honeycombs; our village leas Their fairest-blossom'd beans and poppied corn; The chuckling linnet its five young unborn, To sing for thee; low creeping strawberries Their summer coolness; pent up butterflies Their freckled wings; yea, the fresh budding year All its completionsbe quickly near, By every wind that nods the mountain pine, O forester divine! "Thou, to whom every fawn and satyr flies For willing service; whether to surprise The squatted hare while in half sleeping fit; Or upward ragged precipices flit To save poor lambkins from the eagle's maw; Or by mysterious enticement draw Bewildered shepherds to their path again; Or to tread breathless round the frothy main, And gather up all fancifullest shells For thee to tumble into Naiads' cells, And, being hidden, laugh at their out-peeping; Or to delight thee with fantastic leaping, The while they pelt each other on the crown With silvery oak apples, and fir cones brown By all the echoes that about thee ring, Hear us, O satyr king! "O Hearkener to the loud clapping shears, While ever and anon to his shorn peers A ram goes bleating: Winder of the horn, When snouted wild-boars routing tender corn Anger our huntsman: Breather round our farms, To keep off mildews, and all weather harms: Strange ministrant of undescribed sounds, That come a swooning over hollow grounds, And wither drearily on barren moors: Dread opener of the mysterious doors Leading to universal knowledgesee, Great son of Dryope, The many that are come to pay their vows With leaves about their brows! Be still the unimaginable lodge For solitary thinkings; such as dodge Conception to the very bourne of heaven, Then leave the naked brain: be still the leaven, That spreading in this dull and clodded earth Gives it a touch ethereala new birth: Be still a symbol of immensity; A firmament reflected in a sea; An element filling the space between; An unknownbut no more: we humbly screen With uplift hands our foreheads, lowly bending, And giving out a shout most heaven rending, Conjure thee to receive our humble Paean, Upon thy Mount Lycean! Even while they brought the burden to a close, A shout from the whole multitude arose, That lingered in the air like dying rolls Of abrupt thunder, when Ionian shoals Of dolphins bob their noses through the brine. Meantime, on shady levels, mossy fine, Young companies nimbly began dancing To the swift treble pipe, and humming string. Aye, those fair living forms swam heavenly To tunes forgottenout of memory: Fair creatures! whose young children's children bred Thermopyl its heroesnot yet dead, But in old marbles ever beautiful. High genitors, unconscious did they cull Time's sweet first-fruitsthey danc'd to weariness, And then in quiet circles did they press The hillock turf, and caught the latter end Of some strange history, potent to send A young mind from its bodily tenement. Or they might watch the quoit-pitchers, intent On either side; pitying the sad death Of Hyacinthus, when the cruel breath Of Zephyr slew him,Zephyr penitent, Who now, ere Phoebus mounts the firmament, Fondles the flower amid the sobbing rain. The archers too, upon a wider plain, Beside the feathery whizzing of the shaft, And the dull twanging bowstring, and the raft Branch down sweeping from a tall ash top, Call'd up a thousand thoughts to envelope Those who would watch. Perhaps, the trembling knee And frantic gape of lonely Niobe, Poor, lonely Niobe! when her lovely young Were dead and gone, and her caressing tongue Lay a lost thing upon her paly lip, And very, very deadliness did nip Her motherly cheeks. Arous'd from this sad mood By one, who at a distance loud halloo'd, Uplifting his strong bow into the air, Many might after brighter visions stare: After the Argonauts, in blind amaze Tossing about on Neptune's restless ways, Until, from the horizon's vaulted side, There shot a golden splendour far and wide, Spangling those million poutings of the brine With quivering ore: 'twas even an awful shine From the exaltation of Apollo's bow; A heavenly beacon in their dreary woe. Who thus were ripe for high contemplating, Might turn their steps towards the sober ring Where sat Endymion and the aged priest 'Mong shepherds gone in eld, whose looks increas'd The silvery setting of their mortal star. There they discours'd upon the fragile bar That keeps us from our homes ethereal; And what our duties there: to nightly call Vesper, the beauty-crest of summer weather; To summon all the downiest clouds together For the sun's purple couch; to emulate In ministring the potent rule of fate With speed of fire-tailed exhalations; To tint her pallid cheek with bloom, who cons Sweet poesy by moonlight: besides these, A world of other unguess'd offices. Anon they wander'd, by divine converse, Into Elysium; vieing to rehearse Each one his own anticipated bliss. One felt heart-certain that he could not miss His quick gone love, among fair blossom'd boughs, Where every zephyr-sigh pouts and endows Her lips with music for the welcoming. Another wish'd, mid that eternal spring, To meet his rosy child, with feathery sails, Sweeping, eye-earnestly, through almond vales: Who, suddenly, should stoop through the smooth wind, And with the balmiest leaves his temples bind; And, ever after, through those regions be His messenger, his little Mercury. Some were athirst in soul to see again Their fellow huntsmen o'er the wide champaign In times long past; to sit with them, and talk Of all the chances in their earthly walk; Comparing, joyfully, their plenteous stores Of happiness, to when upon the moors, Benighted, close they huddled from the cold, And shar'd their famish'd scrips. Thus all out-told Their fond imaginations,saving him Whose eyelids curtain'd up their jewels dim, Endymion: yet hourly had he striven To hide the cankering venom, that had riven His fainting recollections. Now indeed His senses had swoon'd off: he did not heed The sudden silence, or the whispers low, Or the old eyes dissolving at his woe, Or anxious calls, or close of trembling palms, Or maiden's sigh, that grief itself embalms: But in the self-same fixed trance he kept, Like one who on the earth had never stept. Aye, even as dead-still as a marble man, Frozen in that old tale Arabian. Who whispers him so pantingly and close? Peona, his sweet sister: of all those, His friends, the dearest. Hushing signs she made, And breath'd a sister's sorrow to persuade A yielding up, a cradling on her care. Her eloquence did breathe away the curse: She led him, like some midnight spirit nurse Of happy changes in emphatic dreams, Along a path between two little streams, Guarding his forehead, with her round elbow, From low-grown branches, and his footsteps slow From stumbling over stumps and hillocks small; Until they came to where these streamlets fall, With mingled bubblings and a gentle rush, Into a river, clear, brimful, and flush With crystal mocking of the trees and sky. A little shallop, floating there hard by, Pointed its beak over the fringed bank; And soon it lightly dipt, and rose, and sank, And dipt again, with the young couple's weight, Peona guiding, through the water straight, Towards a bowery island opposite; Which gaining presently, she steered light Into a shady, fresh, and ripply cove, Where nested was an arbour, overwove By many a summer's silent fingering; To whose cool bosom she was used to bring Her playmates, with their needle broidery, And minstrel memories of times gone by. So she was gently glad to see him laid Under her favourite bower's quiet shade, On her own couch, new made of flower leaves, Dried carefully on the cooler side of sheaves When last the sun his autumn tresses shook, And the tann'd harvesters rich armfuls took. Soon was he quieted to slumbrous rest: But, ere it crept upon him, he had prest Peona's busy hand against his lips, And still, a sleeping, held her finger-tips In tender pressure. And as a willow keeps A patient watch over the stream that creeps Windingly by it, so the quiet maid Held her in peace: so that a whispering blade Of grass, a wailful gnat, a bee bustling Down in the blue-bells, or a wren light rustling Among seer leaves and twigs, might all be heard. O magic sleep! O comfortable bird, That broodest o'er the troubled sea of the mind Till it is hush'd and smooth! O unconfin'd Restraint! imprisoned liberty! great key To golden palaces, strange minstrelsy, Fountains grotesque, new trees, bespangled caves, Echoing grottos, full of tumbling waves And moonlight; aye, to all the mazy world Of silvery enchantment!who, upfurl'd Beneath thy drowsy wing a triple hour, But renovates and lives?Thus, in the bower, Endymion was calm'd to life again. Opening his eyelids with a healthier brain, He said: "I feel this thine endearing love All through my bosom: thou art as a dove Trembling its closed eyes and sleeked wings About me; and the pearliest dew not brings Such morning incense from the fields of May, As do those brighter drops that twinkling stray From those kind eyes,the very home and haunt Of sisterly affection. Can I want Aught else, aught nearer heaven, than such tears? Yet dry them up, in bidding hence all fears That, any longer, I will pass my days Alone and sad. No, I will once more raise My voice upon the mountain-heights; once more Make my horn parley from their foreheads hoar: Again my trooping hounds their tongues shall loll Around the breathed boar: again I'll poll The fair-grown yew tree, for a chosen bow: And, when the pleasant sun is getting low, Again I'll linger in a sloping mead To hear the speckled thrushes, and see feed Our idle sheep. So be thou cheered sweet, And, if thy lute is here, softly intreat My soul to keep in its resolved course." Hereat Peona, in their silver source, Shut her pure sorrow drops with glad exclaim, And took a lute, from which there pulsing came A lively prelude, fashioning the way In which her voice should wander. 'Twas a lay More subtle cadenced, more forest wild Than Dryope's lone lulling of her child; And nothing since has floated in the air So mournful strange. Surely some influence rare Went, spiritual, through the damsel's hand; For still, with Delphic emphasis, she spann'd The quick invisible strings, even though she saw Endymion's spirit melt away and thaw Before the deep intoxication. But soon she came, with sudden burst, upon Her self-possessionswung the lute aside, And earnestly said: "Brother, 'tis vain to hide That thou dost know of things mysterious, Immortal, starry; such alone could thus Weigh down thy nature. Hast thou sinn'd in aught Offensive to the heavenly powers? Caught A Paphian dove upon a message sent? Thy deathful bow against some deer-herd bent, Sacred to Dian? Haply, thou hast seen Her naked limbs among the alders green; And that, alas! is death. No, I can trace Something more high perplexing in thy face!" Endymion look'd at her, and press'd her hand, And said, "Art thou so pale, who wast so bland And merry in our meadows? How is this? Tell me thine ailment: tell me all amiss! Ah! thou hast been unhappy at the change Wrought suddenly in me. What indeed more strange? Or more complete to overwhelm surmise? Ambition is no sluggard: 'tis no prize, That toiling years would put within my grasp, That I have sigh'd for: with so deadly gasp No man e'er panted for a mortal love. So all have set my heavier grief above These things which happen. Rightly have they done: I, who still saw the horizontal sun Heave his broad shoulder o'er the edge of the world, Out-facing Lucifer, and then had hurl'd My spear aloft, as signal for the chace I, who, for very sport of heart, would race With my own steed from Araby; pluck down A vulture from his towery perching; frown A lion into growling, loth retire To lose, at once, all my toil breeding fire, And sink thus low! but I will ease my breast Of secret grief, here in this bowery nest. "This river does not see the naked sky, Till it begins to progress silverly Around the western border of the wood, Whence, from a certain spot, its winding flood Seems at the distance like a crescent moon: And in that nook, the very pride of June, Had I been used to pass my weary eves; The rather for the sun unwilling leaves So dear a picture of his sovereign power, And I could witness his most kingly hour, When he doth lighten up the golden reins, And paces leisurely down amber plains His snorting four. Now when his chariot last Its beams against the zodiac-lion cast, There blossom'd suddenly a magic bed Of sacred ditamy, and poppies red: At which I wondered greatly, knowing well That but one night had wrought this flowery spell; And, sitting down close by, began to muse What it might mean. Perhaps, thought I, Morpheus, In passing here, his owlet pinions shook; Or, it may be, ere matron Night uptook Her ebon urn, young Mercury, by stealth, Had dipt his rod in it: such garland wealth Came not by common growth. Thus on I thought, Until my head was dizzy and distraught. Moreover, through the dancing poppies stole A breeze, most softly lulling to my soul; And shaping visions all about my sight Of colours, wings, and bursts of spangly light; The which became more strange, and strange, and dim, And then were gulph'd in a tumultuous swim: And then I fell asleep. Ah, can I tell The enchantment that afterwards befel? Yet it was but a dream: yet such a dream That never tongue, although it overteem With mellow utterance, like a cavern spring, Could figure out and to conception bring All I beheld and felt. Methought I lay Watching the zenith, where the milky way Among the stars in virgin splendour pours; And travelling my eye, until the doors Of heaven appear'd to open for my flight, I became loth and fearful to alight From such high soaring by a downward glance: So kept me stedfast in that airy trance, Spreading imaginary pinions wide. When, presently, the stars began to glide, And faint away, before my eager view: At which I sigh'd that I could not pursue, And dropt my vision to the horizon's verge; And lo! from opening clouds, I saw emerge The loveliest moon, that ever silver'd o'er A shell for Neptune's goblet: she did soar So passionately bright, my dazzled soul Commingling with her argent spheres did roll Through clear and cloudy, even when she went At last into a dark and vapoury tent Whereat, methought, the lidless-eyed train Of planets all were in the blue again. To commune with those orbs, once more I rais'd My sight right upward: but it was quite dazed By a bright something, sailing down apace, Making me quickly veil my eyes and face: Again I look'd, and, O ye deities, Who from Olympus watch our destinies! Whence that completed form of all completeness? Whence came that high perfection of all sweetness? Speak, stubborn earth, and tell me where, O Where Hast thou a symbol of her golden hair? Not oat-sheaves drooping in the western sun; Notthy soft hand, fair sister! let me shun Such follying before theeyet she had, Indeed, locks bright enough to make me mad; And they were simply gordian'd up and braided, Leaving, in naked comeliness, unshaded, Her pearl round ears, white neck, and orbed brow; The which were blended in, I know not how, With such a paradise of lips and eyes, Blush-tinted cheeks, half smiles, and faintest sighs, That, when I think thereon, my spirit clings And plays about its fancy, till the stings Of human neighbourhood envenom all. Unto what awful power shall I call? To what high fane?Ah! see her hovering feet, More bluely vein'd, more soft, more whitely sweet Than those of sea-born Venus, when she rose From out her cradle shell. The wind out-blows Her scarf into a fluttering pavilion; 'Tis blue, and over-spangled with a million Of little eyes, as though thou wert to shed, Over the darkest, lushest blue-bell bed, Handfuls of daisies.""Endymion, how strange! Dream within dream!""She took an airy range, And then, towards me, like a very maid, Came blushing, waning, willing, and afraid, And press'd me by the hand: Ah! 'twas too much; Methought I fainted at the charmed touch, Yet held my recollection, even as one Who dives three fathoms where the waters run Gurgling in beds of coral: for anon, I felt upmounted in that region Where falling stars dart their artillery forth, And eagles struggle with the buffeting north That balances the heavy meteor-stone; Felt too, I was not fearful, nor alone, But lapp'd and lull'd along the dangerous sky. Soon, as it seem'd, we left our journeying high, And straightway into frightful eddies swoop'd; Such as ay muster where grey time has scoop'd Huge dens and caverns in a mountain's side: There hollow sounds arous'd me, and I sigh'd To faint once more by looking on my bliss I was distracted; madly did I kiss The wooing arms which held me, and did give My eyes at once to death: but 'twas to live, To take in draughts of life from the gold fount Of kind and passionate looks; to count, and count The moments, by some greedy help that seem'd A second self, that each might be redeem'd And plunder'd of its load of blessedness. Ah, desperate mortal! I ev'n dar'd to press Her very cheek against my crowned lip, And, at that moment, felt my body dip Into a warmer air: a moment more, Our feet were soft in flowers. There was store Of newest joys upon that alp. Sometimes A scent of violets, and blossoming limes, Loiter'd around us; then of honey cells, Made delicate from all white-flower bells; And once, above the edges of our nest, An arch face peep'd,an Oread as I guess'd. "Why did I dream that sleep o'er-power'd me In midst of all this heaven? Why not see, Far off, the shadows of his pinions dark, And stare them from me? But no, like a spark That needs must die, although its little beam Reflects upon a diamond, my sweet dream Fell into nothinginto stupid sleep. And so it was, until a gentle creep, A careful moving caught my waking ears, And up I started: Ah! my sighs, my tears, My clenched hands;for lo! the poppies hung Dew-dabbled on their stalks, the ouzel sung A heavy ditty, and the sullen day Had chidden herald Hesperus away, With leaden looks: the solitary breeze Bluster'd, and slept, and its wild self did teaze With wayward melancholy; and r thought, Mark me, Peona! that sometimes it brought Faint fare-thee-wells, and sigh-shrilled adieus! Away I wander'dall the pleasant hues Of heaven and earth had faded: deepest shades Were deepest dungeons; heaths and sunny glades Were full of pestilent light; our taintless rills Seem'd sooty, and o'er-spread with upturn'd gills Of dying fish; the vermeil rose had blown In frightful scarlet, and its thorns out-grown Like spiked aloe. If an innocent bird Before my heedless footsteps stirr'd, and stirr'd In little journeys, I beheld in it A disguis'd demon, missioned to knit My soul with under darkness; to entice My stumblings down some monstrous precipice: Therefore I eager followed, and did curse The disappointment. Time, that aged nurse, Rock'd me to patience. Now, thank gentle heaven! These things, with all their comfortings, are given To my down-sunken hours, and with thee, Sweet sister, help to stem the ebbing sea Of weary life."          Thus ended he, and both Sat silent: for the maid was very loth To answer; feeling well that breathed words Would all be lost, unheard, and vain as swords Against the enchased crocodile, or leaps Of grasshoppers against the sun. She weeps, And wonders; struggles to devise some blame; To put on such a look as would say, Shame On this poor weakness! but, for all her strife, She could as soon have crush'd away the life From a sick dove. At length, to break the pause, She said with trembling chance: "Is this the cause? This all? Yet it is strange, and sad, alas! That one who through this middle earth should pass Most like a sojourning demi-god, and leave His name upon the harp-string, should achieve No higher bard than simple maidenhood, Singing alone, and fearfully,how the blood Left his young cheek; and how he used to stray He knew not where; and how he would say, nay, If any said 'twas love: and yet 'twas love; What could it be but love? How a ring-dove Let fall a sprig of yew tree in his path; And how he died: and then, that love doth scathe, The gentle heart, as northern blasts do roses; And then the ballad of his sad life closes With sighs, and an alas!Endymion! Be rather in the trumpet's mouth,anon Among the winds at largethat all may hearken! Although, before the crystal heavens darken, I watch and dote upon the silver lakes Pictur'd in western cloudiness, that takes The semblance of gold rocks and bright gold sands, Islands, and creeks, and amber-fretted strands With horses prancing o'er them, palaces And towers of amethyst,would I so tease My pleasant days, because I could not mount Into those regions? The Morphean fount Of that fine element that visions, dreams, And fitful whims of sleep are made of, streams Into its airy channels with so subtle, So thin a breathing, not the spider's shuttle, Circled a million times within the space Of a swallow's nest-door, could delay a trace, A tinting of its quality: how light Must dreams themselves be; seeing they're more slight Than the mere nothing that engenders them! Then wherefore sully the entrusted gem Of high and noble life with thoughts so sick? Why pierce high-fronted honour to the quick For nothing but a dream?" Hereat the youth Look'd up: a conflicting of shame and ruth Was in his plaited brow: yet his eyelids Widened a little, as when Zephyr bids A little breeze to creep between the fans Of careless butterflies: amid his pains He seem'd to taste a drop of manna-dew, Full palatable; and a colour grew Upon his cheek, while thus he lifeful spake. "Peona! ever have I long'd to slake My thirst for the world's praises: nothing base, No merely slumberous phantasm, could unlace The stubborn canvas for my voyage prepar'd Though now 'tis tatter'd; leaving my bark bar'd And sullenly drifting: yet my higher hope Is of too wide, too rainbow-large a scope, To fret at myriads of earthly wrecks. Wherein lies happiness? In that which becks Our ready minds to fellowship divine, A fellowship with essence; till we shine, Full alchemiz'd, and free of space. Behold The clear religion of heaven! Fold A rose leaf round thy finger's taperness, And soothe thy lips: hist, when the airy stress Of music's kiss impregnates the free winds, And with a sympathetic touch unbinds Eolian magic from their lucid wombs: Then old songs waken from enclouded tombs; Old ditties sigh above their father's grave; Ghosts of melodious prophecyings rave Round every spot where trod Apollo's foot; Bronze clarions awake, and faintly bruit, Where long ago a giant battle was; And, from the turf, a lullaby doth pass In every place where infant Orpheus slept. Feel we these things?that moment have we stept Into a sort of oneness, and our state Is like a floating spirit's. But there are Richer entanglements, enthralments far More self-destroying, leading, by degrees, To the chief intensity: the crown of these Is made of love and friendship, and sits high Upon the forehead of humanity. All its more ponderous and bulky worth Is friendship, whence there ever issues forth A steady splendour; but at the tip-top, There hangs by unseen film, an orbed drop Of light, and that is love: its influence, Thrown in our eyes, genders a novel sense, At which we start and fret; till in the end, Melting into its radiance, we blend, Mingle, and so become a part of it, Nor with aught else can our souls interknit So wingedly: when we combine therewith, Life's self is nourish'd by its proper pith, And we are nurtured like a pelican brood. Aye, so delicious is the unsating food, That men, who might have tower'd in the van Of all the congregated world, to fan And winnow from the coming step of time All chaff of custom, wipe away all slime Left by men-slugs and human serpentry, Have been content to let occasion die, Whilst they did sleep in love's elysium. And, truly, I would rather be struck dumb, Than speak against this ardent listlessness: For I have ever thought that it might bless The world with benefits unknowingly; As does the nightingale, upperched high, And cloister'd among cool and bunched leaves She sings but to her love, nor e'er conceives How tiptoe Night holds back her dark-grey hood. Just so may love, although 'tis understood The mere commingling of passionate breath, Produce more than our searching witnesseth: What I know not: but who, of men, can tell That flowers would bloom, or that green fruit would swell To melting pulp, that fish would have bright mail, The earth its dower of river, wood, and vale, The meadows runnels, runnels pebble-stones, The seed its harvest, or the lute its tones, Tones ravishment, or ravishment its sweet, If human souls did never kiss and greet? "Now, if this earthly love has power to make Men's being mortal, immortal; to shake Ambition from their memories, and brim Their measure of content; what merest whim, Seems all this poor endeavour after fame, To one, who keeps within his stedfast aim A love immortal, an immortal too. Look not so wilder'd; for these things are true, And never can be born of atomies That buzz about our slumbers, like brain-flies, Leaving us fancy-sick. No, no, I'm sure, My restless spirit never could endure To brood so long upon one luxury, Unless it did, though fearfully, espy A hope beyond the shadow of a dream. My sayings will the less obscured seem, When I have told thee how my waking sight Has made me scruple whether that same night Was pass'd in dreaming. Hearken, sweet Peona! Beyond the matron-temple of Latona, Which we should see but for these darkening boughs, Lies a deep hollow, from whose ragged brows Bushes and trees do lean all round athwart, And meet so nearly, that with wings outraught, And spreaded tail, a vulture could not glide Past them, but he must brush on every side. Some moulder'd steps lead into this cool cell, Far as the slabbed margin of a well, Whose patient level peeps its crystal eye Right upward, through the bushes, to the sky. Oft have I brought thee flowers, on their stalks set Like vestal primroses, but dark velvet Edges them round, and they have golden pits: 'Twas there I got them, from the gaps and slits In a mossy stone, that sometimes was my seat, When all above was faint with mid-day heat. And there in strife no burning thoughts to heed, I'd bubble up the water through a reed; So reaching back to boy-hood: make me ships Of moulted feathers, touchwood, alder chips, With leaves stuck in them; and the Neptune be Of their petty ocean. Oftener, heavily, When love-lorn hours had left me less a child, I sat contemplating the figures wild Of o'er-head clouds melting the mirror through. Upon a day, while thus I watch'd, by flew A cloudy Cupid, with his bow and quiver; So plainly character'd, no breeze would shiver The happy chance: so happy, I was fain To follow it upon the open plain, And, therefore, was just going; when, behold! A wonder, fair as any I have told The same bright face I tasted in my sleep, Smiling in the clear well. My heart did leap Through the cool depth.It moved as if to flee I started up, when lo! refreshfully, There came upon my face, in plenteous showers, Dew-drops, and dewy buds, and leaves, and flowers, Wrapping all objects from my smothered sight, Bathing my spirit in a new delight. Aye, such a breathless honey-feel of bliss Alone preserved me from the drear abyss Of death, for the fair form had gone again. Pleasure is oft a visitant; but pain Clings cruelly to us, like the gnawing sloth On the deer's tender haunches: late, and loth, 'Tis scar'd away by slow returning pleasure. How sickening, how dark the dreadful leisure Of weary days, made deeper exquisite, By a fore-knowledge of unslumbrous night! Like sorrow came upon me, heavier still, Than when I wander'd from the poppy hill: And a whole age of lingering moments crept Sluggishly by, ere more contentment swept Away at once the deadly yellow spleen. Yes, thrice have I this fair enchantment seen; Once more been tortured with renewed life. When last the wintry gusts gave over strife With the conquering sun of spring, and left the skies Warm and serene, but yet with moistened eyes In pity of the shatter'd infant buds, That time thou didst adorn, with amber studs, My hunting cap, because I laugh'd and smil'd, Chatted with thee, and many days exil'd All torment from my breast;'twas even then, Straying about, yet, coop'd up in the den Of helpless discontent,hurling my lance From place to place, and following at chance, At last, by hap, through some young trees it struck, And, plashing among bedded pebbles, stuck In the middle of a brook,whose silver ramble Down twenty little falls, through reeds and bramble, Tracing along, it brought me to a cave, Whence it ran brightly forth, and white did lave The nether sides of mossy stones and rock, 'Mong which it gurgled blythe adieus, to mock Its own sweet grief at parting. Overhead, Hung a lush screen of drooping weeds, and spread Thick, as to curtain up some wood-nymph's home. "Ah! impious mortal, whither do I roam?" Said I, low voic'd: "Ah whither! 'Tis the grot Of Proserpine, when Hell, obscure and hot, Doth her resign; and where her tender hands She dabbles, on the cool and sluicy sands: Or 'tis the cell of Echo, where she sits, And babbles thorough silence, till her wits Are gone in tender madness, and anon, Faints into sleep, with many a dying tone Of sadness. O that she would take my vows, And breathe them sighingly among the boughs, To sue her gentle ears for whose fair head, Daily, I pluck sweet flowerets from their bed, And weave them dyinglysend honey-whispers Round every leaf, that all those gentle lispers May sigh my love unto her pitying! O charitable echo! hear, and sing This ditty to her!tell her"so I stay'd My foolish tongue, and listening, half afraid, Stood stupefied with my own empty folly, And blushing for the freaks of melancholy. Salt tears were coming, when I heard my name Most fondly lipp'd, and then these accents came: Endymion! the cave is secreter Than the isle of Delos. Echo hence shall stir No sighs but sigh-warm kisses, or light noise Of thy combing hand, the while it travelling cloys And trembles through my labyrinthine hair." At that oppress'd I hurried in.Ah! where Are those swift moments? Whither are they fled? I'll smile no more, Peona; nor will wed Sorrow the way to death, but patiently Bear up against it: so farewel, sad sigh; And come instead demurest meditation, To occupy me wholly, and to fashion My pilgrimage for the world's dusky brink. No more will I count over, link by link, My chain of grief: no longer strive to find A half-forgetfulness in mountain wind Blustering about my ears: aye, thou shalt see, Dearest of sisters, what my life shall be; What a calm round of hours shall make my days. There is a paly flame of hope that plays Where'er I look: but yet, I'll say 'tis naught And here I bid it die. Have not I caught, Already, a more healthy countenance? By this the sun is setting; we may chance Meet some of our near-dwellers with my car." This said, he rose, faint-smiling like a star Through autumn mists, and took Peona's hand: They stept into the boat, and launch'd from land. ENDYMION. A Romance. "The stretched metre of an antique song." ~ Shakspeare's Sonnets. INSCRIBED, With Every Feeling Of Pride and Regret and With "A Bowed Mind," To the Memory of The Most English of Poets Except Shakspeare, THOMAS CHATTERON. ------------------------ (line 144): A lovely allusion to the story of Apollo's nine years' sojourn on earth as the herdsman of Admetus, when banished from Olympus for killing the Cyclops who had forged the thunder-bolts wherewith AEsculapius had been slain. (line 232): It was the Hymn to Pan beginning here that the young poet when engaged in the composition of Endymion was induced to recite in the presence of Wordsworth, on the 28th of December 1817, at Haydon's house. Leigh Hunt records that the elder poet pronounced it "a very pretty piece of paganism." (line 319): Doubtless meant to refer specially to the Elgin marbles. (line 347): The reference here is to the passage from the second Book of the Argonautica of Apollonius Rhodius, beginning at verse 674 ... which Shelley had in mind when (Prose Works, Vol. 3, p. 56) he alluded to the Apollo "so finely described by Apollonius Rhodius when the dazzling radiance of his beautiful limbs suddenly shone over the dark Euxine." __ note found before the Preface of Endymion, in the Poetical Works of John Keats, ed. H. Buxton Forman, Crowell publ. 1895. ..., 'In Woodhouse's copy of Endymion there is a note against the passage "so I will begin" &c., line 39, Book I, to the effect that the poem was begun in the spring of 1817 and finished in the winter of 1817-18; and in the title-page he has inserted April before 1818. The statement corresponds with Keats's own record of May 1817, that he was busying himself at Margate with the commencement of Endymion.' PREFACE. Knowing within myself the manner in which this Poem has been produced, it is not without a feeling of regret that I make it public. What manner I mean, will be quite clear to the reader, who must soon perceive great inexperience, immaturity, and every error denoting a feverish attempt, rather than a deed accomplished. The two first books, and indeed the two last, I feel sensible are not of such completion as to warrant their passing the press; nor should they if I thought a year's castigation would do them any good; -- it will not: the foundations are too sandy. It is just that this youngster should die away: a sad thought for me, if I had not some hope that while it is dwindling I may be plotting, and fitting myself for verses fit to live. This may be speaking too presumptuously, and may deserve a punishment: but no feeling man will be forward to inflict it: he will leave me alone, with the conviction that there is not a fiercer hell than the failure in a great object. This is not written with the least atom of purpose to forestall criticisms of course, but from the desire I have to conciliate men who are competent to look, and who do look with a zealous eye, to the honor of English literature. The imagination of a boy is healthy, and the mature imagination of a man is healthy; but there is a space of life between, in which the soul is in a ferment, the character undecided, the way of life uncertain, the ambition thick-sighted: thence proceeds mawkishness, and all the thousand bitters which those men I speak of must necessarily taste in going over the following pages. I hope I have not in too late a day touched the beautiful mythology of Greece, and dulled its brightness: for I wish to try once more, before I bid it farewell. Teignmouth, April 10, 1818. [footnote] Woodhouse notes -- "[for I wish to try once more,] This alluded to his then intention of writing a poem on the fall of Hyperion. He commenced this poem: but, thanks to the critics who fell foul of this work, he discontinued it. The fragment was published in 1820." by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes ~ John Keats, Endymion - Book I

--- IN CHAPTERS (in Dictionaries, in Quotes, in Chapters)

10

   9 Poetry
   4 Integral Yoga
   2 Fiction
   1 Alchemy


   5 John Keats
   4 Sri Aurobindo
   2 Percy Bysshe Shelley


   5 Keats - Poems
   2 Shelley - Poems
   2 Letters On Poetry And Art

1.jk_-_Endymion_-_Book_I, #Keats - Poems, #John Keats, #Poetry   Teignmouth, April 10, 1818.   [footnote] Woodhouse notes -- "[for I wish to try once more,] This alluded to his then intention of writing a poem on the fall of Hyperion. He commenced this poem: but, thanks to the critics who fell foul of this work, he discontinued it. The fragment was published in 1820." by owner. provided at no charge for educational purposes

1.jk_-_Hyperion,_A_Vision_-_Attempted_Reconstruction_Of_The_Poem, #Keats - Poems, #John Keats, #Poetry   object:1.jk - Hyperion, A Vision - Attempted Reconstruction Of The Poem   author class:John Keats   --   His sovereignty, and rule, and majesty:   Blazing Hyperion on his orbed fire   Still sits, still snuffs the incense teeming up   --   But horrors, portioned to a giant nerve,   Make great Hyperion ache. His palace bright,   Bastion'd with pyramids of shining gold,   --   And diamond-paved lustrous long arcades.   Anon rush'd by the bright Hyperion;   His flaming robes stream'd out beyond his heels,

1.jk_-_Hyperion._Book_I, #Keats - Poems, #John Keats, #Poetry   object:1.jk - Hyperion. Book I   author class:John Keats   --   Shook horrid with such aspen-malady:   "O tender spouse of gold Hyperion,   Thea, I feel thee ere I see thy face;   --   His sov'reigny, and rule, and majesy;-   Blazing Hyperion on his orbed fire   Still sat, still snuff'd the incense, teeming up   --   But horrors, portion'd to a giant nerve,   Oft made Hyperion ache. His palace bright,   Bastion'd with pyramids of glowing gold,   --   Hubbub increases more they call out "Hush!"   So at Hyperion's words the phantoms pale   Bestirr'd themselves, thrice horrible and cold;   --   While still the dazzling globe maintain'd eclipse,   Awaiting for Hyperion's command.   Fain would he have commanded, fain took throne

1.jk_-_Hyperion._Book_II, #Keats - Poems, #John Keats, #Poetry   object:1.jk - Hyperion. Book II   author class:John Keats   --   Victory, might be lost, or might be won.   And be ye mindful that Hyperion,   Our brightest brother, still is undisgraced-   --     All eyes were on Enceladus's face,   And they beheld, while still Hyperion's name   Flew from his lips up to the vaulted rocks,   --   Now saw the light and made it terrible.   It was Hyperion:-a granite peak   His bright feet touch'd, and there he stay'd to view

1.jk_-_Hyperion._Book_III, #Keats - Poems, #John Keats, #Poetry   object:1.jk - Hyperion. Book III   author class:John Keats

1.pbs_-_Homers_Hymn_To_Minerva, #Shelley - Poems, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #Fiction   In purple billows, the tide suddenly   Stood still, and great Hyperions son long time   Checked his swift steeds, till, where she stood sublime,

1.pbs_-_Homers_Hymn_To_The_Sun, #Shelley - Poems, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #Fiction   Euryphaessa, the famed sister fair   Of great Hyperion, who to him did bear   A race of loveliest children; the young Morn,

2.05_-_On_Poetry, #Evening Talks With Sri Aurobindo, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga       Disciple: Hyperion of Keats, is it an epic?

2.1.7.07_-_On_the_Verse_and_Structure_of_the_Poem, #Letters On Poetry And Art, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga      Please send me some passages from Savitri together with my selections from the blank-verse poetry of Abercrombie that I sent you in order to help me distinguish at a glance Hyperion from a satyr.

2.2.1.01_-_The_World's_Greatest_Poets, #Letters On Poetry And Art, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga      Yes, I plead guilty. But that, I hope, will be no reason why Vyasa and Sophocles should remain unclassified by you. And the others they intrigue me even more. Who are these others? Saintsbury as good as declares that poetry is Shelley and Shelley poetrySpenser alone, to his mind, can contest the right to that equation. (Shakespeare, of course, is admittedly hors concours.) Aldous Huxley abominates Spenser: the fellow has got nothing to say and says it with a consummately cloying melodiousness! Swinburne, as is well known, could never think of Victor Hugo without bursting into half a dozen alliterative superlatives, while Matthew Arnold it was, I believe, who pitied Hugo for imagining that poetry consisted in using divinit, infinit ternit, as lavishly as possible. And then there is Keats, whose Hyperion compelled even the sneering Byron to forget his usual condescending attitude to wards Johnny and confess that nothing grander had been seen since Aeschylus. Racine, too, cannot be left outcan he? Voltaire adored him, Voltaire who called Shakespeare a drunken barbarian. Finally, what of Wordsworth, whose Immortality Ode was hailed by Mark Pattison as the ne plus ultra of English poetry since the days of Lycidas? Kindly shed the light of infallible viveka on this chaos of jostling opinions.      --      Shelley, Keats and Wordsworth have not been brought into consideration although their best work is as fine poetry as any written, but they have written nothing on a larger scale which would place them among the greatest creators. If Keats had finished Hyperion (without spoiling it), if Shelley had lived, or if Wordsworth had not petered out like a motor car with insufficient petrol, it might be different, but we have to take things as they are. As it is, all began magnificently, but none of them finished, and what work they did, except a few lyrics, sonnets, short pieces and narratives, is often flawed and unequal. If they had to be admitted, what about at least fifty others in Europe and Asia?