V. Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is: Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone, Drive my dead thoughts over the universe Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth AN ODE, [WRITTEN, OCTOBER, 1819, BEFORE THE SPANIARDS HAD RECOVERED THEIR LIBERTY.] ARISE, arise, arise! There is blood on the earth that denies ye bread; To weep for the dead, the dead, the dead. Your sons, your wives, your brethren, were they; Awaken, awaken, awaken! The slave and the tyrant are twin-born foes; To the dust where your kindred repose, repose: 10 Wave, wave high the banner! Be Famine and Toil, giving sigh for sigh. Glory, glory, glory, To those who have greatly suffered and done! Was greater than that which ye shall have won. Whose revenge, pride, and power they have overthrown: Ride ye, more victorious, over your own. Bind, bind every brow Hide the blood-stains now 15 20 95 With crownals of violet, ivy, and pine: With hues which sweet nature has made divine: Green strength, azure hope, and eternity: But let not the pansy among them be; Ye were injured, and that means memory. CANCELLED STANZA. Gather, O gather, Foeman and friend in love and peace! Waves sleep together When the blasts that called them to battle, cease. For fangless Power grown tame and mild Is at play with Freedom's fearless child The dove and the serpent reconciled! THE CLOUD. I BRING fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, 85 40 I bear light shade for the leaves when laid From my wings are shaken the dews that waken When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, I wield the flail of the lashing hail, And whiten the green plains under, I sift the snow on the mountains below, While I sleep in the arms of the blast. In a cavern under is fettered the thunder, Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion, Lured by the love of the genii that move Over the rills, and the crags, and the hills, Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream, And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes, Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, When the morning star shines dead, Which an earthquake rocks and swings, As on the jag of a mountain crag, 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 ardours 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, That orbed maiden with white fire laden, Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor, And wherever the beat of her unseen feet, May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof, 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, Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high, I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone, The volcanos are dim, and the stars reel and swim, 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. When the powers of the air are chained to my chair, Is the million-coloured bow; The sphere-fire above its soft colours 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; For after the rain when with never a stain, The pavilion of heaven is bare, 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 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, 80 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! 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 brightning, Thou dost float and run; Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun. The pale purple even Melts around thy flight; Like a star of heaven, Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight, Keen as are the arrows Of that silver sphere, Whose intense lamp narrows In the white dawn clear, Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there. VOL. I. 2 F |