The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Part 35

SCENE 2.2: A FOREST, INTERMINGLED WITH ROCKS AND CAVERNS.

ASIA AND PANTHEA Pa.s.s INTO IT.

TWO YOUNG FAUNS ARE SITTING ON A ROCK LISTENING.

SEMICHORUS 1 OF SPIRITS: The path through which that lovely twain Have pa.s.sed, by cedar, pine, and yew, And each dark tree that ever grew, Is curtained out from Heaven's wide blue; Nor sun, nor moon, nor wind, nor rain, _5 Can pierce its interwoven bowers, Nor aught, save where some cloud of dew, Drifted along the earth-creeping breeze, Between the trunks of the h.o.a.r trees, Hangs each a pearl in the pale flowers _10 Of the green laurel, blown anew, And bends, and then fades silently, One frail and fair anemone: Or when some star of many a one That climbs and wanders through steep night, _15 Has found the cleft through which alone Beams fall from high those depths upon Ere it is borne away, away, By the swift Heavens that cannot stay, It scatters drops of golden light, _20 Like lines of rain that ne'er unite: And the gloom divine is all around, And underneath is the mossy ground.

SEMICHORUS 2: There the voluptuous nightingales, Are awake through all the broad noonday. _25 When one with bliss or sadness fails, And through the windless ivy-boughs, Sick with sweet love, droops dying away On its mate's music-panting bosom; Another from the swinging blossom, _30 Watching to catch the languid close Of the last strain, then lifts on high The wings of the weak melody, Till some new strain of feeling bear The song, and all the woods are mute; _35 When there is heard through the dim air The rush of wings, and rising there Like many a lake-surrounded flute, Sounds overflow the listener's brain So sweet, that joy is almost pain. _40

NOTE: _38 surrounded B, edition 1839; surrounding 1820.

SEMICHORUS 1: There those enchanted eddies play Of echoes, music-tongued, which draw, By Demogorgon's mighty law, With melting rapture, or sweet awe, All spirits on that secret way; _45 As inland boats are driven to Ocean Down streams made strong with mountain-thaw: And first there comes a gentle sound To those in talk or slumber bound, And wakes the destined soft emotion,-- _50 Attracts, impels them; those who saw Say from the breathing earth behind There steams a plume-uplifting wind Which drives them on their path, while they Believe their own swift wings and feet _55 The sweet desires within obey: And so they float upon their way, Until, still sweet, but loud and strong, The storm of sound is driven along, Sucked up and hurrying: as they fleet _60 Behind, its gathering billows meet And to the fatal mountain bear Like clouds amid the yielding air.

NOTE: _50 destined]destinied 1820.

FIRST FAUN: Canst thou imagine where those spirits live Which make such delicate music in the woods? _65 We haunt within the least frequented caves And closest coverts, and we know these wilds, Yet never meet them, though we hear them oft: Where may they hide themselves?

SECOND FAUN: 'Tis hard to tell; I have heard those more skilled in spirits say, _70 The bubbles, which the enchantment of the sun Sucks from the pale faint water-flowers that pave The oozy bottom of clear lakes and pools, Are the pavilions where such dwell and float Under the green and golden atmosphere _75 Which noontide kindles through the woven leaves; And when these burst, and the thin fiery air, The which they breathed within those lucent domes, Ascends to flow like meteors through the night, They ride on them, and rein their headlong speed, _80 And bow their burning crests, and glide in fire Under the waters of the earth again.

FIRST FAUN: If such live thus, have others other lives, Under pink blossoms or within the bells Of meadow flowers, or folded violets deep, _85 Or on their dying odours, when they die, Or in the sunlight of the sphered dew?

NOTE: _86 on 1820; in B.

SECOND FAUN: Ay, many more which we may well divine.

But should we stay to speak, noontide would come, And thwart Silenus find his goats undrawn, _90 And grudge to sing those wise and lovely songs Of Fate, and Chance, and G.o.d, and Chaos old, And Love, and the chained t.i.tan's woful doom, And how he shall be loosed, and make the earth One brotherhood: delightful strains which cheer _95 Our solitary twilights, and which charm To silence the unenvying nightingales.

NOTE: _93 doom B, edition 1839; dooms 1820.

SCENE 2.3: A PINNACLE OF ROCK AMONG MOUNTAINS.

ASIA AND PANTHEA.

PANTHEA: Hither the sound has borne us--to the realm Of Demogorgon, and the mighty portal, Like a volcano's meteor-breathing chasm, Whence the oracular vapour is hurled up Which lonely men drink wandering in their youth, _5 And call truth, virtue, love, genius, or joy, That maddening wine of life, whose dregs they drain To deep intoxication; and uplift, Like Maenads who cry loud, Evoe! Evoe!

The voice which is contagion to the world. _10

ASIA: Fit throne for such a Power! Magnificent!

How glorious art thou, Earth! And if thou be The shadow of some spirit lovelier still, Though evil stain its work, and it should be Like its creation, weak yet beautiful, _15 I could fall down and worship that and thee.

Even now my heart adoreth: Wonderful!

Look, sister, ere the vapour dim thy brain: Beneath is a wide plain of billowy mist, As a lake, paving in the morning sky, _20 With azure waves which burst in silver light, Some Indian vale. Behold it, rolling on Under the curdling winds, and islanding The peak whereon we stand, midway, around, Encinctured by the dark and blooming forests, _25 Dim twilight-lawns, and stream-illumined caves, And wind-enchanted shapes of wandering mist; And far on high the keen sky-cleaving mountains From icy spires of sun-like radiance fling The dawn, as lifted Ocean's dazzling spray, _30 From some Atlantic islet scattered up, Spangles the wind with lamp-like water-drops.

The vale is girdled with their walls, a howl Of cataracts from their thaw-cloven ravines, Satiates the listening wind, continuous, vast, _35 Awful as silence. Hark! the rushing snow!

The sun-awakened avalanche! whose ma.s.s, Thrice sifted by the storm, had gathered there Flake after flake, in heaven-defying minds As thought by thought is piled, till some great truth _40 Is loosened, and the nations echo round, Shaken to their roots, as do the mountains now.

NOTE: _26 illumed B; illumined 1820.

PANTHEA: Look how the gusty sea of mist is breaking In crimson foam, even at our feet! it rises As Ocean at the enchantment of the moon _45 Round foodless men wrecked on some oozy isle.

ASIA: The fragments of the cloud are scattered up; The wind that lifts them disentwines my hair; Its billows now sweep o'er mine eyes; my brain Grows dizzy; see'st thou shapes within the mist? _50

NOTE: see'st thou B; I see thin 1820; I see 1839.

PANTHEA: A countenance with beckoning smiles: there burns An azure fire within its golden locks!

Another and another: hark! they speak!

SONG OF SPIRITS: To the deep, to the deep, Down, down! _55 Through the shade of sleep, Through the cloudy strife Of Death and of Life; Through the veil and the bar Of things which seem and are _60 Even to the steps of the remotest throne, Down, down!

While the sound whirls around, Down, down!

As the fawn draws the hound, _65 As the lightning the vapour, As a weak moth the taper; Death, despair; love, sorrow; Time both; to-day, to-morrow; As steel obeys the spirit of the stone, _70 Down, down!

Through the gray, void abysm, Down, down!

Where the air is no prism, And the moon and stars are not, _75 And the cavern-crags wear not The radiance of Heaven, Nor the gloom to Earth given, Where there is One pervading, One alone, Down, down! _80

In the depth of the deep, Down, down!

Like veiled lightning asleep, Like the spark nursed in embers, The last look Love remembers, _85 Like a diamond, which shines On the dark wealth of mines, A spell is treasured but for thee alone.

Down, down!

We have bound thee, we guide thee; _90 Down, down!

With the bright form beside thee; Resist not the weakness, Such strength is in meekness That the Eternal, the Immortal, _95 Must unloose through life's portal The snake-like Doom coiled underneath his throne By that alone.

SCENE 2.4: THE CAVE OF DEMOGORGON.

ASIA AND PANTHEA.

PANTHEA: What veiled form sits on that ebon throne?

ASIA: The veil has fallen.

PANTHEA: I see a mighty darkness Filling the seat of power, and rays of gloom Dart round, as light from the meridian sun.

--Ungazed upon and shapeless; neither limb, _5 Nor form, nor outline; yet we feel it is A living Spirit.

DEMOGORGON: Ask what thou wouldst know.

ASIA: What canst thou tell?

DEMOGORGON: All things thou dar'st demand.

ASIA: Who made the living world?

DEMOGORGON: G.o.d.

ASIA: Who made all That it contains? thought, pa.s.sion, reason, will, _10 Imagination?

DEMOGORGON: G.o.d: Almighty G.o.d.

ASIA: Who made that sense which, when the winds of Spring In rarest visitation, or the voice Of one beloved heard in youth alone, Fills the faint eyes with falling tears which dim _15 The radiant looks of unbewailing flowers, And leaves this peopled earth a solitude When it returns no more?

DEMOGORGON: Merciful G.o.d.

ASIA: And who made terror, madness, crime, remorse, Which from the links of the great chain of things, _20 To every thought within the mind of man Sway and drag heavily, and each one reels Under the load towards the pit of death; Abandoned hope, and love that turns to hate; And self-contempt, bitterer to drink than blood; _25 Pain, whose unheeded and familiar speech Is howling, and keen shrieks, day after day; And h.e.l.l, or the sharp fear of h.e.l.l?

DEMOGORGON: He reigns.

ASIA: Utter his name: a world pining in pain Asks but his name: curses shall drag him down. _30