59. I looked, and lo! one stood forth eloquently. His eyes were dark and deep, and the clear brow The oracular mind that made his features glow; He stood thus beautiful. But there was One She was known To be thus fair by the few lines alone Which through her floating locks and gathered cloak, None else beheld her eyes; in him they woke Memories which found a tongue, as thus he silence broke. CANTO II. I. THE starlight smile of children, the sweet looks And the green light which, shifting overhead, The lamplight through the rafters cheerly spread, Such impulses within my mortal frame Like tokens of the dead:-but others came Of minds whom neither time nor change can tame, Traditions dark and old whence evil creeds Start forth, and whose dim shade a stream of poison feeds. 5. I heard, as all have heard, the various story Of human life, and wept unwilling tears. Of daily scorn, and slaves who loathed their state, 4. The land in which I lived by a fell bane Stifled the captive's cry, and to abide All vied Strange fellowship through mutual hate had tied, Which on the paths of men their mingling poison thrust. It cradled the young World,-none wandered forth On every heart. The light which shows its worth 6. This vital world, this home of happy spirits, The realm of a stern ruler, yawned; behind, On their tempestuous flood the shrieking wretch from shore. 7. Out of that ocean's wrecks had Guilt and Woe Framed a dark dwelling for their homeless thought, And, starting at the ghosts which to and fro Glide o'er its dim and gloomy strand, had brought The worship thence which they each other taught. Well might men loathe their life! well might they turn Even to the ills again from which they sought Such refuge after death! well might they learn To gaze on this fair world with hopeless unconcern! 8. For they all pined in bondage; body and soul, Tyrant and slave, victim and torturer, bent Before one Power, to which supreme control Over their will by their own weakness lent Made all its many names omnipotent; All symbols of things evil, all divine; And hymns of blood or mockery, which rent The air from all its fanes, did intertwine Imposture's impious toils round each discordant shrine. 9. I heard, as all have heard, life's various story, And in no careless heart transcribed the tale; But from the sneers of men who had grown hoary In shame and scorn, from groans of crowds made pale By famine, from a mother's desolate wail Poured on the earth, and brows anxious and pale O'er the still sea and jagged islets darted The light of moonrise; in the northern heaven, 12. Such man has been, and such may yet become! My floating thoughts- my heart beat loud and fast-- Of your career shall scatter in its gust The thrones of the oppressor, and the ground Whose idol has so long betrayed your impious trust! 14. "It must be so-I will arise and waken The multitude, and, like a sulphurous hill But Laon? on high freedom's desert land A tower whose marble walls the leaguèd storms withstand!" 15. One summer night, in commune with the hope Among mankind, or when gone far away To the lone shores and mountains, 'twas a guest Which followed where I fled, and watched when I did rest. 16. These hopes found words through which my spirit sought To weave a bondage of such sympathy As might create some response to the thought And oft I thought to clasp my own heart's brother And hear his breath its own swift gaspings smother Felt that we all were sons of one great mother; 18. Yes, oft beside the ruined labyrinth Which skirts the hoary caves of the green deep Round whose worn base the wild waves hiss and leap, And that his friend was false may now be said Calmly-that he, like other men, could weep Tears which are lies, and could betray and spread Snares for that guileless heart which for his own had bled. 19. Then, had no great aim recompensed my sorrow, I must have sought dark respite from its stress In dreamless rest, in sleep that sees no morrow: For to tread life's dismaying wilderness Without one smile to cheer, one voice to bless, Amid the snares and scoffs of humankind, Is hard. But I betrayed it not, nor less, With love that scorned return, sought to unbind The interwoven clouds which make its wisdom blind. 20. With deathless minds, which leave where they have passed A path of light, my soul communion knew; Till from that glorious intercourse, at last, F Words which were weapons ;-round my heart there grew And from my fancy wings of golden hue Where lodestars of delight which drew me home Since kin were cold, and friends had now become Even then, methought, with the world's tyrant rage When those soft eyes of scarcely conscious thought With passion o'er their depths its fleeting light had wrought. 23. She moved upon this earth a shape of brightness, A power that from its objects scarcely drew One impulse of her being-in her lightness Most like some radiant cloud of morning dew Which wanders through the waste air's pathless blue, To nourish some far desert; she did seem, Beside me, gathering beauty as she grew, Like the bright shade of some immortal dream Which walks when tempest sleeps the wave of life's dark stream. 24. As mine own shadow was this child to me, A second self, far dearer and more fair, Which clothed in undissolving radiancy All those steep paths which languor and despair Of friends, and overcome by lonely care, To love in human life-this playmate sweet, Wandered with mine where earth and ocean meet, Through forests wide and old, and lawny dells |