'Trampled its sparks into the dust of death;
As day upon the threshold of the east
Treads out the lamps of night, until the breath
'Of darkness re-illumine even the least
Of heaven's living eyes-like day she came,
Making the night a dream; and ere she ceased

390

'To move, as one between desire and shame Suspended, I said-If, as it doth seem,

395

Thou comest from the realm without a name

'Into this valley of perpetual dream,

Show whence I came, and where I am, and why

Pass not away upon the passing stream.

Arise and quench thy thirst, was her reply.

400

And as a shut lily stricken by the wand

Of dewy morning's vital alchemy,

'I-rose; and, bending at her sweet command, Touched with faint lips the cup she raised, And suddenly my brain became as sand

405

'Where the first wave had more than half erased

The track of deer on desert Labrador;

Whilst the wolf, from which they fled amazed,

'Leaves his stamp visibly upon the shore,

Until the second bursts ;-so on my sight

410

Burst a new vision, never seen before,

'And the fair shape waned in the coming light,
As veil by veil the silent splendour drops
From Lucifer, amid the chrysolite

'Of sunrise, ere it tinge the mountain-tops; And as the presence of that fairest planet,

Although unseen, is felt by one who hopes

That his day's path may end as he began it,

In that star's smile, whose light is like the scent

Of a jonquil when evening breezes fan it,

1

'Or the soft note in which his dear lament The Brescian shepherd breathes, or the caress That turned his weary slumber to content;

'So knew I in that light's severe excess

The presence of that Shape which on the stream
Moved, as I moved along the wilderness,
'More dimly than a day-appearing dream,
The ghost of a forgotten form of sleep;

A light of heaven, whose half-extinguished beam

415

420

425

The favourite song, Stanco di pascolar le pecorelle, is a Brescian national air.-[MRS. SHELLEY'S NOTE.]

'Through the sick day in which we wake to weep
Glimmers, for ever sought, for ever lost;
So did that shape its obscure tenour keep

430

Beside my path, as silent as a ghost;
But the new Vision, and the cold bright car,
With solemn speed and stunning music, crossed

'The forest, and as if from some dread war
Triumphantly returning, the loud million
Fiercely extolled the fortune of her star.

'A moving arch of victory, the vermilion
And green and azure plumes of Iris had
Built high over her wind-wingèd pavilion,
'And underneath aethereal glory clad
The wilderness, and far before her flew
The tempest of the splendour, which forbade

'Shadow to fall from leaf and stone; the crew
Seemed in that light, like atomies to dance
Within a sunbeam ;-some upon the new
'Embroidery of flowers, that did enhance
The grassy vesture of the desert, played,
Forgetful of the chariot's swift advance;
'Others stood gazing, till within the shade
Of the great mountain its light left them dim;
Others outspeeded it; and others made
'Circles around it, like the clouds that swim
Round the high moon in a bright sea of air;
And more did follow, with exulting hymn,

"The chariot and the captives fettered there:-
But all like bubbles on an eddying flood
Fell into the same track at last, and were

435

440

445

450

455

'Borne onward.-I among the multitude

Me, not the shadow nor the solitude;

Was swept-me, sweetest flowers delayed not long;

460

Me, not the phantom of that early Form
Which moved upon its motion-but among

'Me, not that falling stream's Lethean song;

465

'The thickest billows of that living storm
I plunged, and bared my bosom to the clime
Of that cold light, whose airs too soon deform.
'Before the chariot had begun to climb
The opposing steep of that mysterious dell,
Behold a wonder worthy of the rhyme

464 early] aëry cj. Forman.

470

'Of him who from the lowest depths of hell, Through every paradise and through all glory, Love led serene, and who returned to tell

"The words of hate and awe; the wondrous story
How all things are transfigured except Love;
For deaf as is a sea, which wrath makes hoary,

'The world can hear not the sweet notes that move
The sphere whose light is melody to lovers-
A wonder worthy of his rhyme.-The grove

'Grew dense with shadows to its inmost covers, The earth was gray with phantoms, and the air Was peopled with dim forms, as when there hovers

A flock of vampire-bats before the glare Of the tropic sun, bringing, ere evening, Strange night upon some Indian isle;

thus were

'Phantoms diffused around; and some did fling
Shadows of shadows, yet unlike themselves,
Behind them; some like eaglets on the wing

'Were lost in the white day; others like elves
Danced in a thousand unimagined shapes
Upon the sunny streams and grassy shelves;

'And others sate chattering like restless apes
On vulgar hands,

Some made a cradle of the ermined capes

'Of kingly mantles; some across the tiar Of pontiffs sate like vultures; others played Under the crown which girt with empire

'A baby's or an idiot's brow, and made Their nests in it. The old anatomies

475

480

485

490

495

500

Sate hatching their bare broods under the shade

Of daemon wings, and laughed from their dead eyes To reassume the delegated power,

Arrayed in which those worms did monarchize,

'Who made this earth their charnel. Others more Humble, like falcons, sate upon the fist

505

Of common men, and round their heads did soar;

'Or like small gnats and flies, as thick as mist On evening marshes, thronged about the brow Of lawyers, statesmen, priest and theorist ;

510

475 awe Boscombe MS.; care 1824. 486 isle Boscombe MS.; vale 1824. 497 sate like vultures Boscombe MS.; rode like demons 1824,

'And others, like discoloured flakes of snow
On fairest bosoms and the sunniest hair,
Fell, and were melted by the youthful glow

'Which they extinguished; and, like tears, they were
A veil to those from whose faint lids they rained
In drops of sorrow. I became aware

515

'Of whence those forms proceeded which thus stained

The track in which we moved. After brief space,
From every form the beauty slowly waned;

'From every firmest limb and fairest face

520

The strength and freshness fell like dust, and left

The action and the shape without the grace

'Of life. The marble brow of youth was cleft

With care; and in those eyes where once hope shone,
Desire, like a lioness bereft

525

Of her last cub, glared ere it died; each one

Of that great crowd sent forth incessantly

These shadows, numerous as the dead leaves blown

'In autumn evening from a poplar tree. Each like himself and like each other were

530

At first; but some distorted seemed to be

'Obscure clouds, moulded by the casual air;
And of this stuff the car's creative ray
Wrought all the busy phantoms that were there,

'As the sun shapes the clouds; thus on the way
Mask after mask fell from the countenance
And form of all; and long before the day

535

'Was old, the joy which waked like heaven's glance

The sleepers in the oblivious valley, died;

And some grew weary of the ghastly dance,

540

'And fell, as I have fallen, by the wayside ;

Those soonest from whose forms most shadows passed,
And least of strength and beauty did abide.

'Then, what is life? I cried.'—

CANCELLED OPENING OF 'THE TRIUMPH OF LIFE' [Published by Miss M. Blind, Westminster Review, July, 1870.] OUT of the eastern shadow of the Earth,

Amid the clouds upon its margin gray
Scattered by Night to swathe in its bright birth

In gold and fleecy snow the infant Day,
The glorious Sun arose: beneath his light,

The earth and all.

515 those] eyes cj. Rossetti.

...

5

534 Wrought Boscombe MS.; Wrapt 1824.

[The poems which follow appeared, with a few exceptions, either in the volumes published from time to time by Shelley himself, or in the Posthumous Poems of 1824, or in the Poetical Works of 1839, of which a second and enlarged edition was published by Mrs. Shelley in the same year. A few made their

first appearance in some fugitive publication-such as Leigh Hunt's Literary Pocket-Book-and were subsequently incorporated in the collective editions. In every case the editio princeps and (where this is possible) the exact date of composition are indicated below the title.]

STANZA, WRITTEN AT BRACKNELL

[Composed March, 1814. Published in Hogg's Life of Shelley, 1858.]

THY dewy looks sink in my breast;
Thy gentle words stir poison
there;

Thou hast disturbed the only rest
That was the portion of despair!
Subdued to Duty's hard control,

5

I could have borne my wayward

lot:

The chains that bind this ruined soul

Had cankered then-but crushed it not.

STANZAS.-APRIL, 1814

[Composed at Bracknell, April, 1814.

Published with Alastor, 1816.]

AWAY! the moor is dark beneath the moon,

Rapid clouds have drank the last pale beam of even:
Away! the gathering winds will call the darkness soon,

And profoundest midnight shroud the serene lights of heaven.
Pause not! The time is past! Every voice cries, Away!
Tempt not with one last tear thy friend's ungentle mood:

Thy lover's eye, so glazed and cold, dares not entreat thy stay
Duty and dereliction guide thee back to solitude.

Away, away! to thy sad and silent home;

Pour bitter tears on its desolated hearth;

Watch the dim shades as like ghosts they go and come,
And complicate strange webs of melancholy mirth.

The leaves of wasted autumn woods shall float around thine head:
The blooms of dewy spring shall gleam beneath thy feet:

5

10

But thy soul or this world must fade in the frost that binds the dead,

Ere midnight's frown and morning's smile, ere thou and peace may meet.

The cloud shadows of midnight possess their own repose,
For the weary winds are silent, or the moon is in the deep:
Some respite to its turbulence unresting ocean knows;

Whatever moves, or toils, or grieves, hath its appointed sleep.

Thou in the grave shalt rest-yet till the phantoms flee

17

20

Which that house and heath and garden made dear to thee erewhile, Thy remembrance, and repentance, and deep musings are not free From the music of two voices and the light of one sweet smile. Stanzas.-6 tear 1816; glance 1839.