As of some hideous engine whose brazen teeth

smash

The thin winds and soft waves into thunder; the

screams

And hissings, crawl fast o'er the smooth ocean

streams,

Each sound like a centipede. Near this commo

tion

A blue shark is hanging within the blue ocean,
The fin-winged tomb of the victor. The other
Is winning his way from the fate of his brother,
To his own with the speed of despair. Lo! a boat
Advances; twelve rowers with the impulse of

thought

Urge on the keen keel, - the brine foams. At the

stern

Three marksmen stand levelling. Hot bullets burn

In the breast of the tiger, which yet bears him on
To his refuge and ruin. One fragment alone —
"Tis dwindling and sinking, 'tis now almost gone -
Of the wreck of the vessel peers out of the sea.
With her left hand she grasps it impetuously,
With her right hand she sustains her fair infant.
Death, Fear,

Love, Beauty, are mixed in the atmosphere,

Which trembles and burns with the fervor of dread Around her wild eyes, her bright hand, and her head,

Like a meteor of light o'er the waters! her child Is yet smiling, and playing, and murmuring; so smiled

160 impetuously, Shelley, 1820 || convulsively, Harvard MS.

The false deep ere the storm. Like a sister and

brother

The child and the ocean still smile on each other, Whilst

THE CLOUD

I BRING fresh showers for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams;

I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams.

From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet buds every one,

When rocked to rest on their mother's breast,
As she dances about the sun.

I wield the flail of the lashing hail,

And whiten the green plains under, And then again I dissolve it in rain, And laugh as I pass in thunder.

I sift the snow on the mountains below,
And their great pines groan aghast ;
And all the night 'tis my pillow white,

While I sleep in the arms of the blast.
Sublime on the towers of my skyey bowers,
Lightning my pilot sits;

In a cavern under is fettered the thunder,
It struggles and howls at fits;

Over earth and ocean with gentle motion,
This pilot is guiding me,

The Cloud. Published with Prometheus Unbound.
6 buds, Mrs. Shelley, 18391 || birds, Shelley, 1820.

Lured by the love of the genii that move

In the depths of the purple sea ;

Over the rills, and the crags, and the hills,
Over the lakes and the plains,

Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream, The Spirit he loves remains ;

And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, Whilst he is dissolving in rains.

The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes,
And his burning plumes outspread,
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack,

When the morning star shines dead;

As on the jag of a mountain crag,

Which an earthquake rocks and swings,

An eagle alit one moment may sit

In the light of its golden wings.

And when sunset may breathe, from the lit sea beneath,

Its ardors of rest and of love,
And the crimson pall of eve may fall

From the depth of heaven above,
With wings folded I rest, on mine airy nest,
As still as a brooding dove.

That orbed maiden, with white fire laden,
Whom mortals call the Moon,

Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor,
By the midnight breezes strewn ;
And wherever the beat of her unseen feet,
Which only the angels hear,

May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof,

The stars peep behind her and

peer;

And I laugh to see them whirl and flee,

Like a swarm of golden bees,

When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent,
Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas,

Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high,
Are each paved with the moon and these.

I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone,
And the moon's with a girdle of pearl;

The volcanoes are dim, and the stars reel and swim,

When the whirlwinds my banner unfurl. From cape to cape, with a bridge-like shape,

Over a torrent sea,

Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof,

The mountains its columns be.

The triumphal arch, through which I march,
With hurricane, fire, and snow,

When the powers of the air are chained to my chair,

Is the million-colored bow;

The sphere-fire above its soft colors wove, While the moist earth was laughing below.

I am the daughter of earth and water,
And the nursling of the sky;

I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores;
I change, but I cannot die.

For after the rain, when with never a stain

The pavilion of heaven is bare,

And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams

Build up the blue dome of air,

I silently laugh at my own cenotaph,

And out of the caverns of rain,

Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb,

I arise and unbuild it again.

TO A SKYLARK

HAIL to thee, blithe Spirit!
Bird thou never wert,
That from Heaven, or near it,

Pourest thy full heart

In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.

Higher still and higher

From the earth thou springest

Like a cloud of fire;

The blue deep thou wingest,

And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever

singest.

In the golden lightning

Of the sunken sun,

O'er which clouds are bright'ning,

Thou dost float and run;

Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.

The pale purple even

Melts around thy flight;

To a Skylark | the, Harvard MS. cancelled. Published with Prometheus Unbound, 1820. Composed at Leghorn, 1820.

14 Thou dost || Thy wings, Harvard MS. cancelled.