The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Part 104

TO MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT G.o.dWIN.

[Composed June, 1814. Published in "Posthumous Poems", 1824.]

1.

Mine eyes were dim with tears unshed; Yes, I was firm--thus wert not thou;-- My baffled looks did fear yet dread To meet thy looks--I could not know How anxiously they sought to shine _5 With soothing pity upon mine.

2.

To sit and curb the soul's mute rage Which preys upon itself alone; To curse the life which is the cage Of fettered grief that dares not groan, _10 Hiding from many a careless eye The scorned load of agony.

3.

Whilst thou alone, then not regarded, The ... thou alone should be, To spend years thus, and be rewarded, _15 As thou, sweet love, requited me When none were near--Oh! I did wake From torture for that moment's sake.

4.

Upon my heart thy accents sweet Of peace and pity fell like dew _20 On flowers half dead;--thy lips did meet Mine tremblingly; thy dark eyes threw Their soft persuasion on my brain, Charming away its dream of pain.

5.

We are not happy, sweet! our state _25 Is strange and full of doubt and fear; More need of words that ills abate;-- Reserve or censure come not near Our sacred friendship, lest there be No solace left for thee and me. _30

6.

Gentle and good and mild thou art, Nor can I live if thou appear Aught but thyself, or turn thine heart Away from me, or stoop to wear The mask of scorn, although it be _35 To hide the love thou feel'st for me.

NOTES: _2 wert 1839; did 1824.

_3 fear 1824, 1839; yearn cj. Rossetti.

_23 Their 1839; thy 1824.

_30 thee]thou 1824, 1839.

_32 can I 1839; I can 1824.

_36 feel'st 1839; feel 1824.

TO --.

[Published in "Poetical Works", 1839, 2nd edition. See Editor's Note.]

Yet look on me--take not thine eyes away, Which feed upon the love within mine own, Which is indeed but the reflected ray Of thine own beauty from my spirit thrown.

Yet speak to me--thy voice is as the tone _5 Of my heart's echo, and I think I hear That thou yet lovest me; yet thou alone Like one before a mirror, without care Of aught but thine own features, imaged there;

And yet I wear out life in watching thee; _10 A toil so sweet at times, and thou indeed Art kind when I am sick, and pity me...

MUTABILITY.

[Published with "Alastor", 1816.]

We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon; How restlessly they speed, and gleam, and quiver, Streaking the darkness radiantly!--yet soon Night closes round, and they are lost for ever:

Or like forgotten lyres, whose dissonant strings _5 Give various response to each varying blast, To whose frail frame no second motion brings One mood or modulation like the last.

We rest.--A dream has power to poison sleep; We rise.--One wandering thought pollutes the day; _10 We feel, conceive or reason, laugh or weep; Embrace fond woe, or cast our cares away:

It is the same!--For, be it joy or sorrow, The path of its departure still is free: Man's yesterday may ne'er be like his morrow; _15 Nought may endure but Mutability.

NOTES: _15 may 1816; can Lodore, chapter 49, 1835 (Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley).

_16 Nought may endure but 1816; Nor aught endure save Lodore, chapter 49, 1835 (Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley).

ON DEATH.

[For the date of composition see Editor's Note.

Published with "Alastor", 1816.]

THERE IS NO WORK, NOR DEVICE, NOR KNOWLEDGE, NOR WISDOM, IN THE GRAVE, WHITHER THOU GOEST.--Ecclesiastes.

The pale, the cold, and the moony smile Which the meteor beam of a starless night Sheds on a lonely and sea-girt isle, Ere the dawning of morn's undoubted light, Is the flame of life so fickle and wan That flits round our steps till their strength is gone. _5

O man! hold thee on in courage of soul Through the stormy shades of thy worldly way, And the billows of cloud that around thee roll Shall sleep in the light of a wondrous day, _10 Where h.e.l.l and Heaven shall leave thee free To the universe of destiny.

This world is the nurse of all we know, This world is the mother of all we feel, And the coming of death is a fearful blow _15 To a brain unencompa.s.sed with nerves of steel; When all that we know, or feel, or see, Shall pa.s.s like an unreal mystery.

The secret things of the grave are there, Where all but this frame must surely be, _20 Though the fine-wrought eye and the wondrous ear No longer will live to hear or to see All that is great and all that is strange In the boundless realm of unending change.

Who telleth a tale of unspeaking death? _25 Who lifteth the veil of what is to come?

Who painteth the shadows that are beneath The wide-winding caves of the peopled tomb?

Or uniteth the hopes of what shall be With the fears and the love for that which we see? _30

A SUMMER EVENING CHURCHYARD.

LECHLADE, GLOUCESTERSHIRE.

[Composed September, 1815. Published with "Alastor", 1816.]

The wind has swept from the wide atmosphere Each vapour that obscured the sunset's ray; And pallid Evening twines its beaming hair In duskier braids around the languid eyes of Day: Silence and Twilight, unbeloved of men, _5 Creep hand in hand from yon obscurest glen.

They breathe their spells towards the departing day, Encompa.s.sing the earth, air, stars, and sea; Light, sound, and motion own the potent sway, Responding to the charm with its own mystery. _10 The winds are still, or the dry church-tower gra.s.s Knows not their gentle motions as they pa.s.s.

Thou too, aereal Pile! whose pinnacles Point from one shrine like pyramids of fire, Obeyest in silence their sweet solemn spells, _15 Clothing in hues of heaven thy dim and distant spire, Around whose lessening and invisible height Gather among the stars the clouds of night.

The dead are sleeping in their sepulchres: And, mouldering as they sleep, a thrilling sound, _20 Half sense, half thought, among the darkness stirs, Breathed from their wormy beds all living things around, And mingling with the still night and mute sky Its awful hush is felt inaudibly.