Those subtle nets which snare the living and the dead.
XXX
‘His spirit is their power, and they his slaves
In air, and light, and thought, and language, dwell;
390
And keep their state from palaces to graves,
In all resorts of men—invisible,
But when, in ebon mirror, Nightmare fell
To tyrant or impostor bids them rise,
Black-wingèd demon forms—whom, from the hell,
395
His reign and dwelling beneath nether skies,
He loosens to their dark and blasting ministries.
XXXI
In the world’s youth his empire was as firm
As its foundations … Soon the Spirit of Good,
Though in the likeness of a loathsome worm,
400
Sprang from the billows of the formless flood,
Which shrank and fled; and with that Fiend of blood
Renewed the doubtful war … Thrones then first shook,
And earth’s immense and trampled multitude
In hope on their own powers began to look,
405
And Fear, the demon pale, his sanguine shrine forsook.
XXXII
‘Then Greece arose, and to its bards and sages,
In dream, the golden-pinioned Genii came,
Even where they slept amid the night of ages,
Steeping their hearts in the divinest flame
410
Which thy breath kindled, Power of holiest name!
And oft in cycles since, when darkness gave
New weapons to thy foe, their sunlike fame
Upon the combat shone—a light to save,
Like Paradise spread forth beyond the shadowy grave.
XXXIII
415
‘Such is this conflict—when mankind doth strive
With its oppressors in a strife of blood,
Or when free thoughts, like lightnings, are alive,
And in each bosom of the multitude
Justice and truth with Custom’s hydra brood
420
Wage silent war; when Priests and Kings dissemble
In smiles or frowns their fierce disquietude,
When round pure hearts a host of hopes assemble,
The Snake and Eagle meet—the world’s foundations tremble!
XXXIV
‘Thou hast beheld that fight—when to thy home
425
Thou dost return, steep not its hearth in tears;
Though thou may’st hear that earth is now become
The tyrant’s garbage, which to his compeers,
The vile reward of their dishonoured years,
He will dividing give.—The victor Fiend,
430
Omnipotent of yore, now quails, and fears
His triumph dearly won, which soon will lend
An impulse swift and sure to his approaching end.
XXXV
List, stranger, list, mine is an human form,
Like that thou wearest—touch me—shrink not now!
435
My hand thou feel’st is not a ghost’s, but warm
With human blood.—’Twas many years ago,
Since first my thirsting soul aspired to know
The secrets of this wondrous world, when deep
My heart was pierced with sympathy, for woe
Which could not be mine own—and thought did keep,
In dream, unnatural watch beside an infant’s sleep.
XXXVI
‘Woe could not be mine own, since far from men
I dwelt, a free and happy orphan child,
By the sea-shore, in a deep mountain-glen;
445
And near the waves, and through the forests wild,
I roamed, to storm and darkness reconciled:
For I was calm while tempest shook the sky:
But when the breathless heavens in beauty smiled,
I wept, sweet tears, yet too tumultuously
450
For peace, and clasped my hands aloft in ecstasy.
XXXVII
‘These were forebodings of my fate—before
A woman’s heart beat in my virgin breast,
It had been nurtured in divinest lore:
A dying poet gave me books, and blessed
455
With wild but holy talk the sweet unrest
In which I watched him as he died away—
A youth with hoary hair—a fleeting guest
Of our lone mountains: and this lore did sway
My spirit like a storm, contending there alway.
XXXVIII
460
‘Thus the dark tale which history doth unfold
I knew, but not, methinks, as others know,
For they weep not; and Wisdom had unrolled
The clouds which hide the gulf of mortal woe,—
To few can she that warning vision show—
465
For I loved all things with intense devotion;
So that when Hope’s deep source in fullest flow,
Like earthquake did uplift the stagnant ocean
Of human thoughts—mine shook beneath the wide emotion.
XXXIX
‘When first the living blood through all these veins
Kindled a thought in sense, great France sprang forth,
And seized, as if to break, the ponderous chains
Which bind in woe the nations of the earth.
I saw, and started from my cottage-hearth;
And to the clouds and waves in tameless gladness,
475
Shrieked, till they caught immeasurable mirth—
And laughed in light and music: soon, sweet madness
Was poured upon my heart, a soft and thrilling sadness.
XL
‘Deep slumber fell on me:—my dreams were fire—
Soft and delightful thoughts did rest and hover
480
Like shadows o’er my brain; and strange desire,
The tempest of a passion, raging over
My tranquil soul, its depths with light did cover,—
Which passed; and calm, and darkness, sweeter far,
Came—then I loved; but not a human lover!
485
For when I rose from sleep, the Morning Star
Shone through the woodbine-wreaths which round my casement were.
XLI
’Twas like an eye which seemed to smile on me.
I watched, till by the sun made pale, it sank
Under the billows of the heaving sea;
490
But from its beams deep love my spirit drank,
And to my brain the boundless world now shrank
Into one thought—one image—yes, for ever!
Even like the dayspring, poured on vapours dank,
The beams of that one Star did shoot and quiver
495
Through my benighted mind—and were extinguished never.
XLII
‘The day passed thus: at night, methought in dream
A shape of speechless beauty did appear:
It stood like light on a careering stream
Of golden clouds which shook the atmosphere;
500
A wingèd youth, his radiant brow did wear
The Morning Star: a wild dissolving bliss
Over my frame he breathed, approaching near,
And bent his eyes of kindling tenderness
Near mine, and on my lips impressed a lingering kiss,—
XLIII
505
‘And said: “A Spirit loves thee, mortal maiden,
How wilt thou prove thy worth?” Then joy and sleep
Together fled, my soul was deeply laden,
And to the shore I went to muse and weep;
But as I moved, over my heart did creep
510
A
joy less soft, but more profound and strong
Than my sweet dream; and it forbade to keep
The path of the sea-shore: that Spirit’s tongue
Seemed whispering in my heart, and bore my steps along.
XLIV
‘How, to that vast and peopled city led,
515
Which was a field of holy warfare then,
I walked among the dying and the dead,
And shared in fearless deeds with evil men,
Calm as an angel in the dragon’s den—
How I braved death for liberty and truth,
And spurned at peace, and power, and fame—and when
Those hopes had lost the glory of their youth,
How sadly I returned—might move the hearer’s ruth:
XLV
‘Warm tears throng fast! the tale may not be said—
Know then, that when this grief had been subdued,
525
I was not left, like others, cold and dead;
The Spirit whom I loved, in solitude
Sustained his child: the tempest-shaken wood,
These were his voice, and well I understood
530
His smile divine, when the calm sea was bright
With silent stars, and Heaven was breathless with delight.
XLVI
‘In lonely glens, amid the roar of rivers,
When the dim nights were moonless, have I known
Joys which no tongue can tell; my pale lip quivers
535
When thought revisits them:—know thou alone,
That after many wondrous years were flown,
I was awakened by a shriek of woe;
And over me a mystic robe was thrown,
By viewless hands, and a bright Star did glow
540
Before my steps—the Snake then met his mortal foe.’
XLVII
‘Thou fearest not then the Serpent on thy heart?’
‘Fear it!’ she said, with brief and passionate cry,
And spake no more: that silence made me start—
I looked, and we were sailing pleasantly,
545
Swift as a cloud between the sea and sky;
Beneath the rising moon seen far away,
Mountains of ice, like sapphire, piled on high,
Hemming the horizon round, in silence lay
On the still waters—these we did approach alway.
XLVIII
550
And swift and swifter grew the vessel’s motion,
So that a dizzy trance fell on my brain—
Wild music woke me: we had passed the ocean
Which girds the pole, Nature’s remotest reign—
And we glode fast o’er a pellucid plain
555
Of waters, azure with the noontide day.
Ethereal mountains shone around—a Fane
Stood in the midst, girt by green isles which lay
On the blue sunny deep, resplendent far away.
XLIX
It was a Temple, such as mortal hand
560
Has never built, nor ecstasy, nor dream
Reared in the cities of enchanted land:
’Twas likest Heaven, ere yet day’s purple stream
Ebbs o’er the western forest, while the gleam
Of the unrisen moon among the clouds
565
Is gathering—when with many a golden beam
The thronging constellations rush in crowds,
Paving with fire the sky and the marmoreal floods.
L
Like what may be conceived of this vast dome,
When from the depths which thought can seldom pierce
570
Genius beholds it rise, his native home,
Girt by the deserts of the Universe;
Yet, nor in painting’s light, or mightier verse,
Or sculpture’s marble language, can invest
That shape to mortal sense—such glooms immerse
575
That incommunicable sight, and rest
Upon the labouring brain and overburdened breast.
LI
Winding among the lawny islands fair,
Whose blosmy forests starred the shadowy deep,
The wingless boat paused where an ivory stair
580
Its fretwork in the crystal sea did steep,
Encircling that vast Fane’s aërial heap:
We disembarked, and through a portal wide
We passed—whose roof of moonstone carved, did keep
A glimmering o’er the forms on every side,
585
Sculptures like life and thought; immovable, deep-eyed.
LII
We came to a vast hall, whose glorious roof
Was diamond, which had drank the lightning’s sheen
In darkness, and now poured it through the woof
Of spell-inwoven clouds hung there to screen
590
Its blinding splendour—through such veil was seen
That work of subtlest power, divine and rare;
Orb above orb, with starry shapes between,
And hornèd moons, and meteors strange and fair,
On night-black columns poised—one hollow hemisphere!
LIII
595
Ten thousand columns in that quivering light
Distinct—between whose shafts wound far away
With their own radiance than the Heaven of Day;
And on the jasper walls around, there lay
600
Paintings, the poesy of mightiest thought,
Which did the Spirit’s history display;
A tale of passionate change, divinely taught,
Which, in their wingèd dance, unconscious Genii wrought.
LIV
Beneath, there sate on many a sapphire throne,
605
The Great, who had departed from mankind,
A mighty Senate;—some, whose white hair shone
Like mountain snow, mild, beautiful, and blind;
Some, female forms, whose gestures beamed with mind;
And ardent youths, and children bright and fair;
610
And some had lyres whose strings were intertwined
With pale and clinging flames, which ever there
Waked faint yet thrilling sounds that pierced the crystal air.
LV
One seat was vacant in the midst, a throne,
Reared on a pyramid like sculptured flame,
615
Distinct with circling steps which rested on
Their own deep fire—soon as the Woman came
Into that hall, she shrieked the Spirit’s name
And fell; and vanished slowly from the sight.
Darkness arose from her dissolving frame,
620
Which gathering, filled that dome of woven light,
Blotting its spherèd stars with supernatural night.
LVI
Then first, two glittering lights were seen to glide
In circles on the amethystine floor,
Small serpent eyes trailing from side to side,
625
Like meteors on a river’s grassy shore,
They round each other rolled, dilating more
And more—then rose, commingling into one,
One clear and mighty planet hanging o’er
A cloud of deepest shadow, which was thrown
630
Athwart the glowing steps and the crystalline throne.
LVII
The cloud which rested on that cone of flame
Was cloven; beneath the planet sate a Form,
Fairer than tongue can speak or thought may frame,
The radiance of whose limbs rose-
like and warm
635
Flowed forth, and did with softest light inform
The shadowy dome, the sculptures, and the state
Of those assembled shapes—with clinging charm
Sinking upon their hearts and mine. He sate
Majestic, yet most mild—calm, yet compassionate.
LVIII
640
Wonder and joy a passing faintness threw
Over my brow—a hand supported me,
Whose touch was magic strength: an eye of blue
Looked into mine, like moonlight, soothingly;
And a voice said.—‘Thou must a listener be
645
This day—two mighty Spirits now return,
Like birds of calm, from the world’s raging sea,
They pour fresh light from Hope’s immortal urn;
A tale of human power—despair not—list and learn!’
LIX
I looked, and lo! one stood forth eloquently,
650
His eyes were dark and deep, and the clear brow
Which shadowed them was like the morning sky,
The cloudless Heaven of Spring, when in their flow
Through the bright air, the soft winds as they blow
Wake the green world—his gestures did obey
655
The oracular mind that made his features glow,
And where his curvèd lips half-open lay,
Passion’s divinest stream had made impetuous way.
LX
Beneath the darkness of his outspread hair
He stood thus beautiful: but there was One
660
Who sate beside him like his shadow there,
And held his hand—far lovelier—she was known
To be thus fair, by the few lines alone
Which through her floating locks and gathered cloak,
Glances of soul-dissolving glory, shone:—