The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Part 37

And we sail on, away, afar, Without a course, without a star, But, by the instinct of sweet music driven; _90 Till through Elysian garden islets By thee most beautiful of pilots, Where never mortal pinnace glided, The boat of my desire is guided: Realms where the air we breathe is love, _95 Which in the winds on the waves doth move, Harmonizing this earth with what we feel above.

We have pa.s.sed Age's icy caves, And Manhood's dark and tossing waves, And Youth's smooth ocean, smiling to betray: _100 Beyond the gla.s.sy gulfs we flee Of shadow-peopled Infancy, Through Death and Birth, to a diviner day; A paradise of vaulted bowers, Lit by downward-gazing flowers, _105 And watery paths that wind between Wildernesses calm and green, Peopled by shapes too bright to see, And rest, having beheld; somewhat like thee; Which walk upon the sea, and chant melodiously! _110

NOTE: _96 winds and on B; winds on 1820.

END OF ACT 2.

ACT 3.

SCENE 3.1: HEAVEN.

JUPITER ON HIS THRONE; THETIS AND THE OTHER DEITIES a.s.sEMBLED.

JUPITER: Ye congregated powers of heaven, who share The glory and the strength of him ye serve, Rejoice! henceforth I am omnipotent.

All else had been subdued to me; alone The soul of man, like unextinguished fire, _5 Yet burns towards heaven with fierce reproach, and doubt, And lamentation, and reluctant prayer, Hurling up insurrection, which might make Our antique empire insecure, though built On eldest faith, and h.e.l.l's coeval, fear; _10 And though my curses through the pendulous air, Like snow on herbless peaks, fall flake by flake, And cling to it; though under my wrath's night It climbs the crags of life, step after step, Which wound it, as ice wounds unsandalled feet, _15 It yet remains supreme o'er misery, Aspiring, unrepressed, yet soon to fall: Even now have I begotten a strange wonder, That fatal child, the terror of the earth, Who waits but till the destined hour arrive, _20 Bearing from Demogorgon's vacant throne The dreadful might of ever-living limbs Which clothed that awful spirit unbeheld, To redescend, and trample out the spark.

Pour forth heaven's wine, Idaean Ganymede, _25 And let it fill the Daedal cups like fire, And from the flower-inwoven soil divine Ye all-triumphant harmonies arise, As dew from earth under the twilight stars: Drink! be the nectar circling through your veins _30 The soul of joy, ye ever-living G.o.ds, Till exultation burst in one wide voice Like music from Elysian winds.

And thou Ascend beside me, veiled in the light Of the desire which makes thee one with me, _35 Thetis, bright image of eternity!

When thou didst cry, 'Insufferable might!

G.o.d! Spare me! I sustain not the quick flames, The penetrating presence; all my being, Like him whom the Numidian seps did thaw _40 Into a dew with poison, is dissolved, Sinking through its foundations:' even then Two mighty spirits, mingling, made a third Mightier than either, which, unbodied now, Between us floats, felt, although unbeheld, _45 Waiting the incarnation, which ascends, (Hear ye the thunder of the fiery wheels Griding the winds?) from Demogorgon's throne.

Victory! victory! Feel'st thou not, O world, The earthquake of his chariot thundering up _50 Olympus?

[THE CAR OF THE HOUR ARRIVES.

DEMOGORGON DESCENDS, AND MOVES TOWARDS THE THRONE OF JUPITER.]

Awful shape, what art thou? Speak!

NOTES: _5 like unextinguished B, edition 1839; like an unextinguished 1820.

_13 night B, edition 1839; might 1820.

_20 destined B, edition 1839; distant 1820.

DEMOGORGON: Eternity. Demand no direr name.

Descend, and follow me down the abyss.

I am thy child, as thou wert Saturn's child; Mightier than thee: and we must dwell together _55 Henceforth in darkness. Lift thy lightnings not.

The tyranny of heaven none may retain, Or rea.s.sume, or hold, succeeding thee: Yet if thou wilt, as 'tis the destiny Of trodden worms to writhe till they are dead, _60 Put forth thy might.

JUPITER: Detested prodigy!

Even thus beneath the deep t.i.tanian prisons I trample thee! thou lingerest?

Mercy! mercy!

No pity, no release, no respite! Oh, That thou wouldst make mine enemy my judge, _65 Even where he hangs, seared by my long revenge, On Caucasus! he would not doom me thus.

Gentle, and just, and dreadless, is he not The monarch of the world? What then art thou?

No refuge! no appeal!

Sink with me then, _70 We two will sink on the wide waves of ruin, Even as a vulture and a snake outspent Drop, twisted in inextricable fight, Into a sh.o.r.eless sea. Let h.e.l.l unlock Its mounded oceans of tempestuous fire, _75 And whelm on them into the bottomless void This desolated world, and thee, and me, The conqueror and the conquered, and the wreck Of that for which they combated.

Ai, Ai!

The elements obey me not. I sink _80 Dizzily down, ever, for ever, down.

And, like a cloud, mine enemy above Darkens my fall with victory! Ai, Ai!

NOTE: _69 then B, edition 1839; omitted 1820.

SCENE 3.2: THE MOUTH OF A GREAT RIVER IN THE ISLAND ATLANTIS.

OCEAN IS DISCOVERED RECLINING NEAR THE Sh.o.r.e; APOLLO STANDS BESIDE HIM.

OCEAN: He fell, thou sayest, beneath his conqueror's frown?

APOLLO: Ay, when the strife was ended which made dim The orb I rule, and shook the solid stars, The terrors of his eye illumined heaven With sanguine light, through the thick ragged skirts _5 Of the victorious darkness, as he fell: Like the last glare of day's red agony, Which, from a rent among the fiery clouds, Burns far along the tempest-wrinkled deep.

OCEAN: He sunk to the abyss? To the dark void? _10

APOLLO: An eagle so caught in some bursting cloud On Caucasus, his thunder-baffled wings Entangled in the whirlwind, and his eyes Which gazed on the undazzling sun, now blinded By the white lightning, while the ponderous hail _15 Beats on his struggling form, which sinks at length p.r.o.ne, and the aereal ice clings over it.

OCEAN: Henceforth the fields of heaven-reflecting sea Which are my realm, will heave, unstained with blood, Beneath the uplifting winds, like plains of corn _20 Swayed by the summer air; my streams will flow Round many-peopled continents, and round Fortunate isles; and from their gla.s.sy thrones Blue Proteus and his humid nymphs shall mark The shadow of fair ships, as mortals see _25 The floating bark of the light-laden moon With that white star, its sightless pilot's crest, Borne down the rapid sunset's ebbing sea; Tracking their path no more by blood and groans, And desolation, and the mingled voice _30 Of slavery and command; but by the light Of wave-reflected flowers, and floating odours, And music soft, and mild, free, gentle voices, And sweetest music, such as spirits love.

NOTES: _22 many-peopled B; many peopled 1820.

_26 light-laden B; light laden 1820.

APOLLO: And I shall gaze not on the deeds which make _35 My mind obscure with sorrow, as eclipse Darkens the sphere I guide; but list, I hear The small, clear, silver lute of the young Spirit That sits i' the morning star.

NOTE: _39 i' the B, edition 1839; on the 1820.

OCEAN: Thou must away; Thy steeds will pause at even, till when farewell: _40 The loud deep calls me home even now to feed it With azure calm out of the emerald urns Which stand for ever full beside my throne.

Behold the Nereids under the green sea, Their wavering limbs borne on the wind-like stream, _45 Their white arms lifted o'er their streaming hair With garlands pied and starry sea-flower crowns, Hastening to grace their mighty sister's joy.

[A SOUND OF WAVES IS HEARD.]

It is the unpastured sea hungering for calm.

Peace, monster; I come now. Farewell.

APOLLO: Farewell. _50

SCENE 3.3: CAUCASUS.

PROMETHEUS, HERCULES, IONE, THE EARTH, SPIRITS, ASIA, AND PANTHEA, BORNE IN THE CAR WITH THE SPIRIT OF THE HOUR.

HERCULES UNBINDS PROMETHEUS, WHO DESCENDS.

HERCULES: Most glorious among Spirits, thus doth strength To wisdom, courage, and long-suffering love, And thee, who art the form they animate, Minister like a slave.

PROMETHEUS: Thy gentle words Are sweeter even than freedom long desired _5 And long delayed.

Asia, thou light of life, Shadow of beauty unbeheld: and ye, Fair sister nymphs, who made long years of pain Sweet to remember, through your love and care: Henceforth we will not part. There is a cave, _10 All overgrown with trailing odorous plants, Which curtain out the day with leaves and flowers, And paved with veined emerald, and a fountain Leaps in the midst with an awakening sound.

From its curved roof the mountain's frozen tears _15 Like snow, or silver, or long diamond spires, Hang downward, raining forth a doubtful light: And there is heard the ever-moving air, Whispering without from tree to tree, and birds, And bees; and all around are mossy seats, _20 And the rough walls are clothed with long soft gra.s.s; A simple dwelling, which shall be our own; Where we will sit and talk of time and change, As the world ebbs and flows, ourselves unchanged.

What can hide man from mutability? _25 And if ye sigh, then I will smile; and thou, Ione, shalt chant fragments of sea-music, Until I weep, when ye shall smile away The tears she brought, which yet were sweet to shed.

We will entangle buds and flowers and beams _30 Which twinkle on the fountain's brim, and make Strange combinations out of common things, Like human babes in their brief innocence; And we will search, with looks and words of love, For hidden thoughts, each lovelier than the last, _35 Our unexhausted spirits; and like lutes Touched by the skill of the enamoured wind, Weave harmonies divine, yet ever new, From difference sweet where discord cannot be; And hither come, sped on the charmed winds, _40 Which meet from all the points of heaven, as bees From every flower aereal Enna feeds, At their known island-homes in Himera, The echoes of the human world, which tell Of the low voice of love, almost unheard, _45 And dove-eyed pity's murmured pain, and music, Itself the echo of the heart, and all That tempers or improves man's life, now free; And lovely apparitions,--dim at first, Then radiant, as the mind, arising bright _50 From the embrace of beauty (whence the forms Of which these are the phantoms) casts on them The gathered rays which are reality-- Shall visit us, the progeny immortal Of Painting, Sculpture, and rapt Poesy, _55 And arts, though unimagined, yet to be.

The wandering voices and the shadows these Of all that man becomes, the mediators Of that best worship love, by him and us Given and returned; swift shapes and sounds, which grow _60 More fair and soft as man grows wise and kind, And, veil by veil, evil and error fall: Such virtue has the cave and place around.

[TURNING TO THE SPIRIT OF THE HOUR.]

For thee, fair Spirit, one toil remains. Ione, Give her that curved sh.e.l.l, which Proteus old _65 Made Asia's nuptial boon, breathing within it A voice to be accomplished, and which thou Didst hide in gra.s.s under the hollow rock.

IONE: Thou most desired Hour, more loved and lovely Than all thy sisters, this is the mystic sh.e.l.l; _70 See the pale azure fading into silver Lining it with a soft yet glowing light: Looks it not like lulled music sleeping there?

SPIRIT: It seems in truth the fairest sh.e.l.l of Ocean: Its sound must be at once both sweet and strange. _75

PROMETHEUS: Go, borne over the cities of mankind On whirlwind-footed coursers: once again Outspeed the sun around the orbed world; And as thy chariot cleaves the kindling air, Thou breathe into the many-folded sh.e.l.l, _80 Loosening its mighty music; it shall be As thunder mingled with clear echoes: then Return; and thou shalt dwell beside our cave.

And thou, O Mother Earth!--

THE EARTH: I hear, I feel; Thy lips are on me, and thy touch runs down _85 Even to the adamantine central gloom Along these marble nerves; 'tis life, 'tis joy, And, through my withered, old, and icy frame The warmth of an immortal youth shoots down Circling. Henceforth the many children fair _90 Folded in my sustaining arms; all plants, And creeping forms, and insects rainbow-winged, And birds, and beasts, and fish, and human shapes, Which drew disease and pain from my wan bosom, Draining the poison of despair, shall take _95 And interchange sweet nutriment; to me Shall they become like sister-antelopes By one fair dam, snow-white and swift as wind, Nursed among lilies near a br.i.m.m.i.n.g stream.

The dew-mists of my sunless sleep shall float _100 Under the stars like balm: night-folded flowers Shall suck unwithering hues in their repose: And men and beasts in happy dreams shall gather Strength for the coming day, and all its joy: And death shall be the last embrace of her _105 Who takes the life she gave, even as a mother, Folding her child, says, 'Leave me not again.'