The Complete Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley Read online

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  To remember their strange light in many a dream

  Of after-times; but youthful maidens, taught

  By nature, would interpret half the woe

  That wasted him, would call him with false names

  Brother, and friend, would press his pallid hand

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  At parting, and watch, dim through tears, the path

  Of his departure from their father’s door.

  At length upon the lone Chorasmian shore

  He paused, a wide and melancholy waste

  Of putrid marshes. A strong impulse urged

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  His steps to the sea-shore. A swan was there,

  Beside a sluggish stream among the reeds.

  It rose as he approached, and with strong wings

  Scaling the upward sky, bent its bright course

  High over the immeasurable main.

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  His eyes pursued its flight.—‘Thou hast a home,

  Beautiful bird; thou voyagest to thine home,

  Where thy sweet mate will twine her downy neck

  With thine, and welcome thy return with eyes

  Bright in the lustre of their own fond joy.

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  And what am I that I should linger here,

  With voice far sweeter than thy dying notes,

  Spirit more vast than thine, frame more attuned

  To beauty, wasting these surpassing powers

  In the deaf air, to the blind earth, and heaven

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  That echoes not my thoughts?’ A gloomy smile

  Of desperate hope wrinkled his quivering lips.

  For sleep, he knew, kept most relentlessly

  Its precious charge, and silent death exposed,

  Faithless perhaps as sleep, a shadowy lure,

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  With doubtful smile mocking its own strange charms.

  Startled by his own thoughts he looked around.

  There was no fair fiend near him, not a sight

  Or sound of awe but in his own deep mind.

  A little shallop floating near the shore

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  Caught the impatient wandering of his gaze.

  It had been long abandoned, for its sides

  Gaped wide with many a rift, and its frail joints

  Swayed with the undulations of the tide.

  A restless impulse urged him to embark

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  And meet lone Death on the drear ocean’s waste;

  For well he knew that mighty Shadow loves

  The slimy caverns of the populous deep.

  The day was fair and sunny, sea and sky

  Drank its inspiring radiance, and the wind

  Swept strongly from the shore, blackening the waves.

  Following his eager soul, the wanderer

  Leaped in the boat, he spread his cloak aloft

  On the bare mast, and took his lonely seat,

  And felt the boat speed o’er the tranquil sea

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  Like a torn cloud before the hurricane.

  As one that in a silver vision floats

  Obedient to the sweep of odorous winds

  Upon resplendent clouds, so rapidly

  Along the dark and ruffled waters fled

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  The straining boat.—A whirlwind swept it on,

  With fierce gusts and precipitating force,

  Through the white ridges of the chafed sea.

  The waves arose. Higher and higher still

  Their fierce necks writhed beneath the tempest’s scourge

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  Like serpents struggling in a vulture’s grasp.

  Calm and rejoicing in the fearful war

  Of wave ruining on wave, and blast on blast

  Descending, and black flood on whirlpool driven

  With dark obliterating course, he sate:

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  As if their genii were the ministers

  Appointed to conduct him to the light

  Of those belovèd eyes the Poet sate

  Holding the steady helm. Evening came on,

  The beams of sunset hung their rainbow hues

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  High ’mid the shifting domes of sheeted spray

  That canopied his path o’er the waste deep;

  Twilight, ascending slowly from the east,

  Entwined in duskier wreaths her braided locks

  O’er the fair front and radiant eyes of day;

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  Night followed, clad with stars. On every side

  More horribly the multitudinous streams

  Of ocean’s mountainous waste to mutual war

  Rushed in dark tumult thundering, as to mock

  The calm and spangled sky. The little boat

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  Still fled before the storm; still fled like foam

  Down the steep cataract of a wintry river;

  Now pausing on the edge of the riven wave;

  Now leaving far behind the bursting mass

  That fell, convulsing ocean: safely fled—

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  As if that frail and wasted human form,

  Had been an elemental god.

  At midnight

  The moon arose: and lo! the ethereal cliffs

  Of Caucasus, whose icy summits shone

  Among the stars like sunlight, and around

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  Whose caverned base the whirlpools and the waves

  Bursting and eddying irresistibly

  Rage and resound for ever.—Who shall save?—

  The boat fled on,—the boiling torrent drove,—

  The crags closed round with black and jagged arms,

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  The shattered mountain overhung the sea,

  And faster still, beyond all human speed,

  Suspended on the sweep of the smooth wave,

  The little boat was driven. A cavern there

  Yawned, and amid its slant and winding depths

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  Ingulfed the rushing sea. The boat fled on

  With unrelaxing speed.—‘Vision and Love!’

  The Poet cried aloud, ‘I have beheld

  The path of thy departure. Sleep and death

  Shall not divide us long!’

  The boat pursued

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  The windings of the cavern. Daylight shone

  At length upon that gloomy river’s flow;

  Now, where the fiercest war among the waves

  Is calm, on the unfathomable stream

  The boat moved slowly. Where the mountain, riven,

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  Exposed those black depths to the azure sky,

  Ere yet the flood’s enormous volume fell

  Even to the base of Caucasus, with sound

  That shook the everlasting rocks, the mass

  Filled with one whirlpool all that ample chasm;

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  Stair above stair the eddying waters rose,

  Circling immeasurably fast, and laved

  With alternating dash the gnarled roots

  Of mighty trees, that stretched their giant arms

  In darkness over it. I’ the midst was left,

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  Reflecting, yet distorting every cloud,

  A pool of treacherous and tremendous calm.

  Seized by the sway of the ascending stream,

  With dizzy swiftness, round, and round, and round,

  Ridge after ridge the straining boat arose,

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  Till on the verge of the extremest curve,

  Where, through an opening of the rocky bank,

  The waters overflow, and a smooth spot

  Of glassy quiet mid those battling tides

  Is left, the boat paused shuddering.—Shall it sink

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  Down the abyss? Shall the reverting stress

  Of that resistless gulf embosom it?

  Now shall it fall?—A wandering stream of
wind,

  Breathed from the west, has caught the expanded sail,

  And, lo! with gentle motion, between banks

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  Of mossy slope, and on a placid stream,

  Beneath a woven grove it sails, and, hark!

  The ghastly torrent mingles its far roar,

  With the breeze murmuring in the musical woods.

  Where the embowering trees recede, and leave

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  A little space of green expanse, the cove

  Is closed by meeting banks, whose yellow flowers

  For ever gaze on their own drooping eyes,

  Reflected in the crystal calm. The wave

  Of the boat’s motion marred their pensive task,

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  Which nought but vagrant bird, or wanton wind,

  Or falling spear-grass, or their own decay

  Had e’er disturbed before. The Poet longed

  To deck with their bright hues his withered hair,

  But on his heart its solitude returned,

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  And he forbore. Not the strong impulse hid

  In those flushed cheeks, bent eyes, and shadowy frame

  Had yet performed its ministry: it hung

  Upon his life, as lightning in a cloud

  Gleams, hovering ere it vanish, ere the floods

  Of night close over it.

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  The noonday sun

  Now shone upon the forest, one vast mass

  Of mingling shade, whose brown magnificence

  A narrow vale embosoms. There, huge caves,

  Scooped in the dark base of their aëry rocks

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  Mocking its moans, respond and roar for ever.

  The meeting boughs and implicated leaves

  Wove twilight o’er the Poet’s path, as led

  By love, or dream, or god, or mightier Death,

  He sought in Nature’s dearest haunt, some bank,

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  Her cradle, and his sepulchre. More dark

  And dark the shades accumulate. The oak,

  Expanding its immense and knotty arms,

  Embraces the light beech. The pyramids

  Of the tall cedar overarching, frame

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  Most solemn domes within, and far below,

  Like clouds suspended in an emerald sky,

  The ash and the acacia floating hang

  Tremulous and pale. Like restless serpents, clothed

  In rainbow and in fire, the parasites,

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  Starred with ten thousand blossoms, flow around

  The grey trunks, and, as gamesome infants’ eyes,

  With gentle meanings, and most innocent wiles,

  Fold their beams round the hearts of those that love,

  These twine their tendrils with the wedded boughs

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  Uniting their close union; the woven leaves

  Make net-work of the dark blue light of day,

  And the night’s noontide clearness, mutable

  As shapes in the weird clouds. Soft mossy lawns

  Beneath these canopies extend their swells,

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  Fragrant with perfumed herbs, and eyed with blooms

  Minute yet beautiful. One darkest glen

  Sends from its woods of musk-rose, twined with jasmine,

  A soul-dissolving odour, to invite

  To some more lovely mystery. Through the dell,

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  Silence and Twilight here, twin-sisters, keep

  Their noonday watch, and sail among the shades,

  Like vaporous shapes half seen; beyond, a well,

  Dark, gleaming, and of most translucent wave,

  Images all the woven boughs above,

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  And each depending leaf, and every speck

  Of azure sky, darting between their chasms;

  Nor aught else in the liquid mirror laves

  Its portraiture, but some inconstant star

  Between one foliaged lattice twinkling fair,

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  Or, painted bird, sleeping beneath the moon,

  Or gorgeous insect floating motionless,

  Unconscious of the day, ere yet his wings

  Have spread their glories to the gaze of noon.

  Hither the Poet came. His eyes beheld

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  Their own wan light through the reflected lines

  Of his thin hair, distinct in the dark depth

  Of that still fountain; as the human heart,

  Gazing in dreams over the gloomy grave,

  Sees its own treacherous likeness there. He heard

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  The motion of the leaves, the grass that sprung

  Startled and glanced and trembled even to feel

  An unaccustomed presence, and the sound

  Of the sweet brook that from the secret springs

  Of that dark fountain rose. A Spirit seemed

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  To stand beside him—clothed in no bright robes

  Of shadowy silver or enshrining light.

  Borrowed from aught the visible world affords

  Of grace, or majesty, or mystery;—

  But, undulating woods, and silent well,

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  And leaping rivulet, and evening gloom

  Now deepening the dark shades, for speech assuming,

  Held commune with him, as if he and it

  Were all that was,—only … when his regard

  Was raised by intense pensiveness, … two eyes,

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  Two starry eyes, hung in the gloom of thought,

  And seemed with their serene and azure smiles

  To beckon him.

  Obedient to the light

  That shone within his soul, he went, pursuing

  The windings of the dell.—The rivulet

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  Wanton and wild, through many a green ravine

  Beneath the forest flowed. Sometimes it fell

  Among the moss with hollow harmony

  Dark and profound. Now on the polished stones

  It danced; like childhood laughing as it went:

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  Then, through the plain in tranquil wanderings crept,

  Reflecting every herb and drooping bud

  That overhung its quietness.—‘O stream!

  Whose source is inaccessibly profound,

  Whither do thy mysterious waters tend?

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  Thou imagest my life. Thy darksome stillness,

  Thy dazzling waves, thy loud and hollow gulfs,

  Thy searchless fountain, and invisible course

  Have each their type in me; and the wide sky,

  And measureless ocean may declare as soon

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  What oozy cavern or what wandering cloud

  Contains thy waters, as the universe

  Tell where these living thoughts reside, when stretched

  Upon thy flowers my bloodless limbs shall waste

  I’ the passing wind!’

  Beside the grassy shore

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  Of the small stream he went; he did impress

  On the green moss his tremulous step, that caught

  Strong shuddering from his burning limbs. As one

  Roused by some joyous madness from the couch

  Of fever, he did move; yet, not like him,

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  Forgetful of the grave, where, when the flame

  Of his frail exultation shall be spent,

  He must descend. With rapid steps he went

  Beneath the shade of trees, beside the flow

  Of the wild babbling rivulet; and now

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  The forest’s solemn canopies were changed

  For the uniform and lightsome evening sky.

  Grey rocks did peep from the spare moss, and stemmed

  The struggling brook: tall spires of windlestrae

  Threw their
thin shadows down the rugged slope,

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  And nought but gnarled roots of ancient pines

  Branchless and blasted, clenched with grasping roots

  The unwilling soil. A gradual change was here,

  Yet ghastly. For, as fast years flow away,

  The smooth brow gathers, and the hair grows thin

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  And white, and where irradiate dewy eyes

  Had shone, gleam stony orbs:—so from his steps

  Bright flowers departed, and the beautiful shade

  Of the green groves, with all their odorous winds

  And musical motions. Calm, he still pursued

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  The stream, that with a larger volume now

  Rolled through the labyrinthine dell; and there

  Fretted a path through its descending curves

  With its wintry speed. On every side now rose

  Rocks, which, in unimaginable forms,

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  Lifted their black and barren pinnacles

  In the light of evening, and, its precipice

  Obscuring the ravine, disclosed above,

  Mid toppling stones, black gulfs and yawning caves,

  Whose windings gave ten thousand various tongues

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  To the loud stream. Lo! where the pass expands

  Its stony jaws, the abrupt mountain breaks,

  And seems, with its accumulated crags,

  To overhang the world: for wide expand

  Beneath the wan stars and descending moon

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  Islanded seas, blue mountains, mighty streams,

  Dim tracts and vast, robed in the lustrous gloom

  Of leaden-coloured even, and fiery hills

  Mingling their flames with twilight, on the verge

  Of the remote horizon. The near scene,

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  In naked and severe simplicity,

  Made contrast with the universe. A pine,

  Rock-rooted, stretched athwart the vacancy

  Its swinging boughs, to each inconstant blast