Percy Bysshe Shelley

by Percy Bysshe Shelley

  Will disenchant the captives, and will pour

  For the despairing, from the crystal wells

  Of thy deep spirit, reason’s mighty lore,

  And power shall then abound, and hope arise once more.

  XLIII

  ‘Can man be free if woman be a slave?

  Chain one who lives, and breathes this boundless air,

  To the corruption of a closèd grave!

  Can they, whose mates are beasts condemned to bear

  Scorn heavier far than toil or anguish, dare

  To trample their oppressors? In their home,

  Among their babes, thou knowest a curse would wear

  The shape of woman — hoary Crime would come

  Behind, and Fraud rebuild Religion’s tottering dome.

  XLIV

  ‘I am a child: — I would not yet depart.

  When I go forth alone, bearing the lamp

  Aloft which thou hast kindled in my heart,

  Millions of slaves from many a dungeon damp

  Shall leap in joy, as the benumbing cramp

  Of ages leaves their limbs. No ill may harm

  Thy Cythna ever. Truth its radiant stamp

  Has fixed, as an invulnerable charm,

  Upon her children’s brow, dark Falsehood to disarm.

  XLV

  ‘Wait yet awhile for the appointed day.

  Thou wilt depart, and I with tears shall stand

  Watching thy dim sail skirt the ocean gray;

  Amid the dwellers of this lonely land

  I shall remain alone — and thy command

  Shall then dissolve the world’s unquiet trance,

  And, multitudinous as the desert sand

  Borne on the storm, its millions shall advance,

  Thronging round thee, the light of their deliverance.

  XLVI

  ‘Then, like the forests of some pathless mountain

  Which from remotest glens two warring winds

  Involve in fire which not the loosened fountain

  Of broadest floods might quench, shall all the kinds

  Of evil catch from our uniting minds

  The spark which must consume them; — Cythna then

  Will have cast off the impotence that binds

  Her childhood now, and through the paths of men

  Will pass, as the charmed bird that haunts the serpent’s den.

  XLVII

  ‘We part! — O Laon, I must dare, nor tremble,

  To meet those looks no more! — Oh, heavy stroke!

  Sweet brother of my soul! can I dissemble

  The agony of this thought?’ — As thus she spoke

  The gathered sobs her quivering accents broke,

  And in my arms she hid her beating breast.

  I remained still for tears — sudden she woke

  As one awakes from sleep, and wildly pressed

  My bosom, her whole frame impetuously possessed.

  XLVIII

  ‘We part to meet again — but yon blue waste,

  Yon desert wide and deep, holds no recess

  Within whose happy silence, thus embraced,

  We might survive all ills in one caress;

  Nor doth the grave — I fear ‘t is passionless —

  Nor yon cold vacant Heaven: — we meet again

  Within the minds of men, whose lips shall bless

  Our memory, and whose hopes its light retain

  When these dissevered bones are trodden in the plain.’

  XLIX

  I could not speak, though she had ceased, for now

  The fountains of her feeling, swift and deep,

  Seemed to suspend the tumult of their flow.

  So we arose, and by the star-light steep

  Went homeward — neither did we speak nor weep,

  But, pale, were calm with passion. Thus subdued,

  Like evening shades that o’er the mountains creep,

  We moved towards our home; where, in this mood,

  Each from the other sought refuge in solitude.

  REVOLT OF ISLAM: Canto Third

  I

  WHAT thoughts had sway o’er Cythna’s lonely slumber

  That night, I know not; but my own did seem

  As if they might ten thousand years outnumber

  Of waking life, the visions of a dream

  Which hid in one dim gulf the troubled stream

  Of mind; a boundless chaos wild and vast,

  Whose limits yet were never memory’s theme;

  And I lay struggling as its whirlwinds passed,

  Sometimes for rapture sick, sometimes for pain aghast.

  II

  Two hours, whose mighty circle did embrace

  More time than might make gray the infant world,

  Rolled thus, a weary and tumultuous space;

  When the third came, like mist on breezes curled,

  From my dim sleep a shadow was unfurled;

  Methought, upon the threshold of a cave

  I sate with Cythna; drooping briony, pearled

  With dew from the wild streamlet’s shattered wave,

  Hung, where we sate to taste the joys which Nature gave.

  III

  We lived a day as we were wont to live,

  But Nature had a robe of glory on,

  And the bright air o’er every shape did weave

  Intenser hues, so that the herbless stone,

  The leafless bough among the leaves alone,

  Had being clearer than its own could be;

  And Cythna’s pure and radiant self was shown,

  In this strange vision, so divine to me,

  That if I loved before, now love was agony.

  IV

  Morn fled, noon came, evening, then night, descended,

  And we prolonged calm talk beneath the sphere

  Of the calm moon — when suddenly was blended

  With our repose a nameless sense of fear;

  And from the cave behind I seemed to hear

  Sounds gathering upwards — accents incomplete,

  And stifled shrieks, — and now, more near and near,

  A tumult and a rush of thronging feet

  The cavern’s secret depths beneath the earth did beat.

  V

  The scene was changed, and away, away, away!

  Through the air and over the sea we sped,

  And Cythna in my sheltering bosom lay,

  And the winds bore me; through the darkness spread

  Around, the gaping earth then vomited

  Legions of foul and ghastly shapes, which hung

  Upon my flight; and ever as we fled

  They plucked at Cythna; soon to me then clung

  A sense of actual things those monstrous dreams among.

  VI

  And I lay struggling in the impotence

  Of sleep, while outward life had burst its bound,

  Though, still deluded, strove the tortured sense

  To its dire wanderings to adapt the sound

  Which in the light of morn was poured around

  Our dwelling; breathless, pale and unaware

  I rose, and all the cottage crowded found

  With armèd men, whose glittering swords were bare,

  And whose degraded limbs the Tyrant’s garb did wear.

  VII

  And ere with rapid lips and gathered brow

  I could demand the cause, a feeble shriek —

  It was a feeble shriek, faint, far and low —

  Arrested me; my mien grew calm and meek,

  And grasping a small knife I went to seek

  That voice among the crowd—’t was Cythna’s cry!

  Beneath most calm resolve did agony wreak

  Its whirlwind rage: — so I passed quietly

  Till I beheld where bound that dearest child did lie.

  VIII

  I started to behold her, for delight

  And exultation, and a joyance free,

 
Solemn, serene and lofty, filled the light

  Of the calm smile with which she looked on me;

  So that I feared some brainless ecstasy,

  Wrought from that bitter woe, had wildered her.

  ‘Farewell! farewell!’ she said, as I drew nigh;

  ‘At first my peace was marred by this strange stir,

  Now I am calm as truth — its chosen minister.

  IX

  ‘Look not so, Laon — say farewell in hope;

  These bloody men are but the slaves who bear

  Their mistress to her task; it was my scope

  The slavery where they drag me now to share,

  And among captives willing chains to wear

  Awhile — the rest thou knowest. Return, dear friend!

  Let our first triumph trample the despair

  Which would ensnare us now, for, in the end,

  In victory or in death our hopes and fears must blend.’

  X

  These words had fallen on my unheeding ear,

  Whilst I had watched the motions of the crew

  With seeming careless glance; not many were

  Around her, for their comrades just withdrew

  To guard some other victim; so I drew

  My knife, and with one impulse, suddenly,

  All unaware three of their number slew,

  And grasped a fourth by the throat, and with loud cry

  My countrymen invoked to death or liberty.

  XI

  What followed then I know not, for a stroke,

  On my raised arm and naked head came down,

  Filling my eyes with blood. — When I awoke,

  I felt that they had bound me in my swoon,

  And up a rock which overhangs the town

  By the steep path were bearing me; below

  The plain was filled with slaughter, — overthrown

  The vineyards and the harvests, and the glow

  Of blazing roofs shone far o’er the white Ocean’s flow.

  XII

  Upon that rock a mighty column stood,

  Whose capital seemed sculptured in the sky,

  Which to the wanderers o’er the solitude

  Of distant seas, from ages long gone by,

  Had made a landmark; o’er its height to fly

  Scarcely the cloud, the vulture or the blast

  Has power, and when the shades of evening lie

  On Earth and Ocean, its carved summits cast

  The sunken daylight far through the aërial waste.

  XIII

  They bore me to a cavern in the hill

  Beneath that column, and unbound me there;

  And one did strip me stark; and one did fill

  A vessel from the putrid pool; one bare

  A lighted torch, and four with friendless care

  Guided my steps the cavern-paths along;

  Then up a steep and dark and narrow stair

  We wound, until the torch’s fiery tongue

  Amid the gushing day beamless and pallid hung.

  XIV

  They raised me to the platform of the pile,

  That column’s dizzy height; the grate of brass,

  Through which they thrust me, open stood the while,

  As to its ponderous and suspended mass,

  With chains which eat into the flesh, alas!

  With brazen links, my naked limbs they bound;

  The grate, as they departed to repass,

  With horrid clangor fell, and the far sound

  Of their retiring steps in the dense gloom was drowned.

  XV

  The noon was calm and bright: — around that column

  The overhanging sky and circling sea,

  Spread forth in silentness profound and solemn,

  The darkness of brief frenzy cast on me,

  So that I knew not my own misery;

  The islands and the mountains in the day

  Like clouds reposed afar; and I could see

  The town among the woods below that lay,

  And the dark rocks which bound the bright and glassy bay.

  XVI

  It was so calm, that scarce the feathery weed

  Sown by some eagle on the topmost stone

  Swayed in the air: — so bright, that noon did breed

  No shadow in the sky beside mine own —

  Mine, and the shadow of my chain alone.

  Below, the smoke of roofs involved in flame

  Rested like night; all else was clearly shown

  In that broad glare; yet sound to me none came,

  But of the living blood that ran within my frame.

  XVII

  The peace of madness fled, and ah, too soon!

  A ship was lying on the sunny main;

  Its sails were flagging in the breathless noon;

  Its shadow lay beyond. That sight again

  Waked with its presence in my trancèd brain

  The stings of a known sorrow, keen and cold;

  I knew that ship bore Cythna o’er the plain

  Of waters, to her blighting slavery sold,

  And watched it with such thoughts as must remain untold.

  XVIII

  I watched until the shades of evening wrapped

  Earth like an exhalation; then the bark

  Moved, for that calm was by the sunset snapped.

  It moved a speck upon the Ocean dark;

  Soon the wan stars came forth, and I could mark

  Its path no more! I sought to close mine eyes,

  But, like the balls, their lids were stiff and stark;

  I would have risen, but ere that I could rise

  My parchèd skin was split with piercing agonies.

  XIX

  I gnawed my brazen chain, and sought to sever

  Its adamantine links, that I might die.

  O Liberty! forgive the base endeavor,

  Forgive me, if, reserved for victory,

  The Champion of thy faith e’er sought to fly!

  That starry night, with its clear silence, sent

  Tameless resolve which laughed at misery

  Into my soul — linkèd remembrance lent

  To that such power, to me such a severe content.

  XX

  To breathe, to be, to hope, or to despair

  And die, I questioned not; nor, though the Sun,

  Its shafts of agony kindling through the air,

  Moved over me, nor though in evening dun,

  Or when the stars their visible courses run,

  Or morning, the wide universe was spread

  In dreary calmness round me, did I shun

  Its presence, nor seek refuge with the dead

  From one faint hope whose flower a dropping poison shed.

  XXI

  Two days thus passed — I neither raved nor died;

  Thirst raged within me, like a scorpion’s nest

  Built in mine entrails; I had spurned aside

  The water-vessel, while despair possessed

  My thoughts, and now no drop remained. The uprest

  Of the third sun brought hunger — but the crust

  Which had been left was to my craving breast

  Fuel, not food. I chewed the bitter dust,

  And bit my bloodless arm, and licked the brazen rust.

  XXII

  My brain began to fail when the fourth morn

  Burst o’er the golden isles. A fearful sleep,

  Which through the caverns dreary and forlorn

  Of the riven soul sent its foul dreams to sweep

  With whirlwind swiftness — a fall far and deep —

  A gulf, a void, a sense of senselessness —

  These things dwelt in me, even as shadows keep

  Their watch in some dim charnel’s loneliness, —

  A shoreless sea, a sky sunless and planetless!

  XXIII

  The forms which peopled this terrific trance

  I well remember. Like a
choir of devils,

  Around me they involved a giddy dance;

  Legions seemed gathering from the misty levels

  Of Ocean, to supply those ceaseless revels, —

  Foul, ceaseless shadows; thought could not divide

  The actual world from these entangling evils,

  Which so bemocked themselves that I descried

  All shapes like mine own self hideously multiplied.

  XXIV

  The sense of day and night, of false and true,

  Was dead within me. Yet two visions burst

  That darkness; one, as since that hour I knew,

  Was not a phantom of the realms accursed,

  Where then my spirit dwelt — but of the first

  I know not yet, was it a dream or no;

  But both, though not distincter, were immersed

  In hues which, when through memory’s waste they flow,

  Make their divided streams more bright and rapid now.

  XXV

  Methought that grate was lifted, and the seven,

  Who brought me thither, four stiff corpses bare,

  And from the frieze to the four winds of Heaven

  Hung them on high by the entangled hair;

  Swarthy were three — the fourth was very fair;

  As they retired, the golden moon upsprung,

  And eagerly, out in the giddy air,

  Leaning that I might eat, I stretched and clung

  Over the shapeless depth in which those corpses hung.

  XXVI

  A woman’s shape, now lank and cold and blue,

  The dwelling of the many-colored worm,

  Hung there; the white and hollow cheek I drew

  To my dry lips — What radiance did inform

  Those horny eyes? whose was that withered form?

  Alas, alas! it seemed that Cythna’s ghost

  Laughed in those looks, and that the flesh was warm

  Within my teeth! — a whirlwind keen as frost

  Then in its sinking gulfs my sickening spirit tossed.

  XXVII

  Then seemed it that a tameless hurricane

  Arose, and bore me in its dark career

  Beyond the sun, beyond the stars that wane

  On the verge of formless pace — it languished there,

  And, dying, left a silence lone and drear,

  More horrible than famine. In the deep

  The shape of an old man did then appear,

  Stately and beautiful; that dreadful sleep

  His heavenly smiles dispersed, and I could wake and weep.

  XXVIII

  And, when the blinding tears had fallen, I saw

  That column, and those corpses, and the moon,

  And felt the poisonous tooth of hunger gnaw

  My vitals; I rejoiced, as if the boon

  Of senseless death would be accorded soon,

  When from that stony gloom a voice arose,

  Solemn and sweet as when low winds attune