Since she had food:-therefore I did awaken The Tartar steed, who, from his ebon mane, Soon as the clinging slumbers he had shaken, Bent his thin head to seek the brazen rein, Following me obediently; with pain
Of heart, so deep and dread, that one caress, When lips and heart refuse to part again,
Till they have told their fill, could scarce express The anguish of her mute and fearful tenderness,
Cythna beheld me part, as I bestrode
That willing steed-the tempest and the night, Which gave my path its safety as I rode Down the ravine of rocks, did soon unite The darkness and the tumult of their might Borne on all winds.-Far thro' the streaming rain Floating at intervals the garments white
Of Cythna gleamed, and her voice once again Came to me on the gust, and soon I reached the plain.
I dreaded not the tempest, nor did he
Who bore me, but his eyeballs wide and red Turned on the lightning's cleft exultingly;
And when the earth beneath his tameless tread, Shook with the sullen thunder, he would spread His nostrils to the blast, and joyously
Mock the fierce peal with neighings; thus we sped O'er the lit plain, and soon I could descry
Where Death and Fire had gorged the spoil of victory.
There was a desolate village in a wood
Whose bloom-inwoven leaves now scattering fed The hungry storm; it was a place of blood,
A heap of hearthless walls;-the flames were dead Within those dwellings now,-the life had fled From all those corpses now, but the wide sky Flooded with lightning was ribbed overhead By the black rafters, and around did lie
Women, and babes, and men, slaughtered confusedly.
Beside the fountain in the market-place Dismounting, I beheld those corpses stare With horny eyes upon each other's face, And on the earth and on the vacant air, And upon me, close to the waters where
I stooped to slake my thirst;-I shrank to taste, For the salt bitterness of blood was there; But tied the steed beside, and sought in haste If any yet survived amid that ghastly waste.
No living thing was there beside one woman, Whom I found wandering in the streets, and she Was withered from a likeness of aught human Into a fiend, by some strange misery:
Soon as she heard my steps she leaped on me, And glued her burning lips to mine, and laughed With a loud, long, and frantic laugh of glee, And cried, "Now Mortal, thou hast deeply quaffed The Plague's blue kisses-soon millions shall pledge the draught!
"My name is Pestilence-this bosom dry, Once fed two babes-a sister and a brother- When I came home, one in the blood did lie
Of three death-wounds-the flames had ate the other! Since then I have no longer been a mother, But I am Pestilence;-hither and thither
I flit about, that I may slay and smother:— All lips which I have kissed must surely wither, But Death's-if thou art he, we'll go to work together!
"What seek'st thou here? the moonlight comes in flashes,The dew is rising dankly from the dell
"Twill moisten her! and thou shalt see the gashes
In my sweet boy, now full of worms-but tell
First what thou seek'st."-"I seek for food."-""Tis well, Thou shalt have food; Famine, my paramour, Waits for us at the feast-cruel and fell
Is Famine, but he drives not from his door
Those whom these lips have kissed, alone. No more, no more!"
As thus she spake, she grasped me with the strength Of madness, and by many a ruined hearth She led, and over many a corpse:-at length We came to a lone hut, where on the earth Which made its floor, she in her ghastly mirth Gathering from all those homes now desolate, Had piled three heaps of loaves, making a dearth Among the dead-round which she set in state A ring of cold, stiff babes; silent and stark they sate.
She leaped upon a pile, and lifted high
Her mad looks to the lightning, and cried: "Eat! Share the great feast-to-morrow we must die!" And then she spurned the loaves with her pale feet, Towards her bloodless guests;-that sight to meet, Mine eyes and my heart ached, and but that she Who loved me, did with absent looks defeat Despair, I might have raved in sympathy; But now I took the food that woman offered me;
And vainly having with her madness striven If I might win her to return with me, Departed. In the eastern beams of Heaven The lightning now grew pallid-rapidly, As by the shore of the tempestuous sea The dark steed bore me, and the mountain grey Soon echoed to his hoofs, and I could see Cythna among the rocks, where she alway
Had sate, with anxious eyes fixed on the lingering day.
And joy was ours to meet: she was most pale, Famished, and wet and weary, so I cast My arms around her, lest her steps should fail As to our home we went, and thus embraced, Her full heart seemed a deeper joy to taste Than e'er the prosperous know; the steed behind. Trod peacefully along the mountain waste, We reached our home ere morning could unbind Night's latest veil, and on our bridal couch reclined.
Her chilled heart having cherished in my bosom, And sweetest kisses past, we two did share Our peaceful meal:-as an autumnal blossom Which spreads its shrunk leaves in the sunny air, After cold showers, like rainbows woven there, Thus in her lips and cheeks the vital spirit Mantled, and in her eyes, an atmosphere
Of health, and hope; and sorrow languished near it, And fear, and all that dark despondence doth inherit.
So we sate joyous as the morning ray
Which fed upon the wrecks of night and storm Now lingering on the winds; light airs did play Among the dewy weeds, the sun was warm, And we sate linked in the inwoven charm Of converse and caresses sweet and deep, Speechless caresses, talk that might disarm
Time, tho' he wield the darts of death and sleep, And those thrice mortal barbs in his own poison steep.
I told her of my sufferings and my madness, And how, awakened from that dreamy mood By Liberty's uprise, the strength of gladness Came to my spirit in my solitude;
And all that now I was, while tears pursued Each other down her fair and listening cheek Fast as the thoughts which fed them, like a flood From sunbright dales; and when I ceased to speak, Her accents soft and sweet the pausing air did wake.
She told me a strange tale of strange endurance, Like broken memories of many a heart Woven into one; to which no firm assurance, So wild were they, could her own faith impart. She said that not a tear did dare to start
From the swoln brain, and that her thoughts were firm When from all mortal hope she did depart,
Borne by those slaves across the Ocean's term, And that she reached the port without one fear infirm.
One was she among many there, the thralls Of the cold Tyrant's cruel lust: and they Laughed mournfully in those polluted halls; But she was calm and sad, musing alway On loftiest enterprise, till on a day
The Tyrant heard her singing to her lute A wild, and sad, and spirit-thrilling lay,
Like winds that die in wastes-one moment mute The evil thoughts it made, which did his breast pollute.
Even when he saw her wondrous loveliness, One moment to great Nature's sacred power He bent, and was no longer passionless; But when he bade her to his secret bower Be borne, a loveless victim, and she tore Her locks in agony, and her words of flame And mightier looks availed not; then he bore Again his load of slavery, and became
A king, a heartless beast, a pageant and a name.
She told me what a loathsome agony
Is that when selfishness mocks love's delight, Foul as in dream's most fearful imagery To dally with the mowing dead-that night All torture, fear, or horror made seem light
Which the soul dreams or knows, and when the day Shone on her awful frenzy, from the sight Where like a Spirit in fleshly chains she lay Struggling, aghast and pale the Tyrant fled away.
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