Adonais Part 6

She knew not 'twas her own,--as with no stain She faded, like a cloud which had outwept its rain.

11.

One from a lucid urn of starry dew Washed his light limbs, as if embalming them; Another dipt her profuse locks, and threw The wreath upon him, like an anadem Which frozen tears instead of pearls begem; 5 Another in her wilful grief would break Her bow and winged reeds, as if to stem A greater loss with one which was more weak, And dull the barbed fire against his frozen cheek.

12.

Another Splendour on his mouth alit, That mouth whence it was wont to draw the breath Which gave it strength to pierce the guarded wit, And pa.s.s into the panting heart beneath With lightning and with music: the damp death 5 Quenched its caress upon his icy lips; And, as a dying meteor stains a wreath Of moonlight vapour which the cold night clips, It flushed through his pale limbs, and pa.s.sed to its eclipse.

13.

And others came,--Desires and Adorations, Winged Persuasions, and veiled Destinies, Splendours, and Glooms, and glimmering incarnations Of Hopes and Fears, and twilight Phantasies; And Sorrow, with her family of Sighs, 5 And Pleasure, blind with tears, led by the gleam Of her own dying smile instead of eyes, Came in slow pomp;--the moving pomp might seem Like pageantry of mist on an autumnal stream.

14.

All he had loved, and moulded into thought From shape and hue and odour and sweet sound.

Lamented Adonais. Morning sought Her eastern watch-tower, and her hair unbound, Wet with the tears which should adorn the ground, 5 Dimmed the aerial eyes that kindle day; Afar the melancholy Thunder moaned, Pale Ocean in unquiet slumber lay, And the wild Winds flew round, sobbing in their dismay.

15.

Lost Echo sits amid the voiceless mountains, And feeds her grief with his remembered lay, And will no more reply to winds or fountains, Or amorous birds perched on the young green spray, Or herdsman's horn, or bell at closing day; 5 Since she can mimic not his lips, more dear Than those for whose disdain she pined away Into a shadow of all sounds:--a drear Murmur, between their songs, is all the woodmen hear.

16.

Grief made the young Spring wild, and she threw down Her kindling buds, as if she Autumn were, Or they dead leaves; since her delight is flown, For whom should she have waked the sullen Year?

To Phoebus was not Hyacinth so dear, 5 Nor to himself Narcissus, as to both Thou, Adonais; wan they stand and sere Amid the faint companions of their youth, With dew all turned to tears,--odour, to sighing ruth.

17.

Thy spirit's sister, the lorn nightingale, Mourns not her mate with such melodious pain; Not so the eagle, who like thee could scale Heaven, and could nourish in the sun's domain Her mighty young with morning, doth complain, 5 Soaring and screaming round her empty nest, As Albion wails for thee: the curse of Cain Light on his head who pierced thy innocent breast, And scared the angel soul that was its earthly guest!

18.

Ah woe is me! Winter is come and gone, But grief returns with the revolving year.

The airs and streams renew their joyous tone; The ants, the bees, the swallows, re-appear; Fresh leaves and flowers deck the dead Seasons' bier; 5 The amorous birds now pair in every brake, And build their mossy homes in field and brere; And the green lizard and the golden snake, Like unimprisoned flames, out of their trance awake.

19.

Through wood and stream and field and hill and ocean, A quickening life from the Earth's heart has burst, As it has ever done, with change and motion, From the great morning of the world when first G.o.d dawned on chaos. In its steam immersed, 5 The lamps of heaven flash with a softer light; All baser things pant with life's sacred thirst, Diffuse themselves, and spend in love's delight The beauty and the joy of their renewed might.

20.

The leprous corpse, touched by this spirit tender, Exhales itself in flowers of gentle breath; Like incarnations of the stars, when splendour Is changed to fragrance, they illumine death, And mock the merry worm that wakes beneath. 5 Nought we know dies: shall that alone which knows Be as a sword consumed before the sheath By sightless lightning? Th' intense atom glows A moment, then is quenched in a most cold repose.

21.

Alas that all we loved of him should be, But for our grief, as if it had not been, And grief itself be mortal! Woe is me!

Whence are we, and why are we? of what scene The actors or spectators? Great and mean 5 Meet ma.s.sed in death, who lends what life must borrow.

As long as skies are blue and fields are green, Evening must usher night, night urge the morrow, Month follow month with woe, and year wake year to sorrow.

22.

_He_ will awake no more, oh never more!

'Wake thou,' cried Misery, 'childless Mother; Rise Out of thy sleep, and slake in thy heart's core A wound more fierce than his, with tears and sighs.'

And all the Dreams that watched Urania's eyes, 5 And all the Echoes whom their Sister's song Had held in holy silence, cried 'Arise!'

Swift as a thought by the snake memory stung, From her ambrosial rest the fading Splendour sprung.

23.

She rose like an autumnal Night that springs Out of the east, and follows wild and drear The golden Day, which on eternal wings, Even as a ghost abandoning a bier, Had left the Earth a corpse. Sorrow and fear 5 So struck, so roused, so rapt, Urania; So saddened round her like an atmosphere Of stormy mist; so swept her on her way, Even to the mournful place where Adonais lay.

24.

Out of her secret paradise she sped, Through camps and cities rough with stone and steel And human hearts, which, to her aery tread Yielding not, wounded the invisible Palms of her tender feet where'er they fell. 5 And barbed tongues, and thoughts more sharp than they, Rent the soft form they never could repel, Whose sacred blood, like the young tears of May, Paved with eternal flowers that undeserving way.

25.

In the death-chamber for a moment Death, Shamed by the presence of that living might, Blushed to annihilation, and the breath Revisited those lips, and life's pale light Flashed through those limbs so late her dear delight. 5 'Leave me not wild and drear and comfortless, As silent lightning leaves the starless night!

Leave me not!' cried Urania. Her distress Roused Death: Death rose and smiled, and met her vain caress.

26.

'Stay yet awhile! speak to me once again!

Kiss me, so long but as a kiss may live!

And in my heartless breast and burning brain That word, that kiss, shall all thoughts else survive, With food of saddest memory kept alive, 5 Now thou art dead, as if it were a part Of thee, my Adonais! I would give All that I am, to be as thou now art:-- But I am chained to Time, and cannot thence depart.

27

'O gentle child, beautiful as thou wert, Why didst thou leave the trodden paths of men Too soon, and with weak hands though mighty heart Dare the unpastured dragon in his den?

Defenceless as thou wert, oh where was then 5 Wisdom the mirrored shield, or scorn the spear?-- Or, hadst thou waited the full cycle when Thy spirit should have filled its crescent sphere, The monsters of life's waste had fled from thee like deer.