Endymion Book II
O Sovereign power of love!
O grief!
O balm!
All records, saving thine, come cool, and calm,
And shadowy, through the mist of passed years:
For others, good or bad, hatred and
Have become indolent; but touching thine,
One sigh doth echo, one poor sob doth pine,
One kiss brings honey-dew from buried days.
The woes of Troy, towers smothering o'er their blaze,
Stiff-holden shields, far-piercing spears, keen blades,
Struggling, and blood, and shrieks--all dimly
Into some backward corner of the brain;
Yet, in our very souls, we feel
The close of Troilus and Cressid sweet.
Hence, pageant history! hence, gilded cheat!
Swart planet in the universe of deeds!
Wide sea, that one continuous murmur
Along the pebbled shore of memory!
Many old rotten-timber'd boats there
Upon thy vaporous bosom,
To goodly vessels; many a sail of pride,
And golden keel'd, is left unlaunch'd and dry.
But wherefore this?
What care, though owl did
About the great Athenian admiral's mast?
What care, though striding Alexander
The Indus with his Macedonian numbers?
Though old Ulysses tortured from his
The glutted Cyclops, what care?--Juliet
Amid her
Tenderly her fancy from its maiden snow,
Doth more avail than these: the silver
Of Hero's tears, the swoon of Imogen,
Fair Pastorella in the bandit's den,
Are things to brood on with more
Than the death-day of empires.
Must such conviction come upon his head,
Who, thus far, discontent, has dared to tread,
Without one muse's smile, or kind behest,
The path of love and poesy.
But rest,
In chaffing restlessness, is yet more
Than to be crush'd, in striving to
Love's standard on the battlements of song.
So once more days and nights aid me along,
Like legion'd soldiers. Brain-sick shepherd-prince,
What promise hast thou faithful guarded
The day of sacrifice?
Or, have new
Come with the constant dawn upon thy morrows?
Alas! 'tis his old grief.
For many days,
Has he been wandering in uncertain ways:
Through wilderness, and woods of mossed oaks;
Counting his woe-worn minutes, by the
Of the lone woodcutter; and listening still,
Hour after hour, to each lush-leav'd rill.
Now he is sitting by a shady spring,
And elbow-deep with feverous
Stems the upbursting cold: a wild rose
Pavilions him in bloom, and he doth seeA bud which snares his fancy: lo! but
He plucks it, dips its stalk in the water: how!
It swells, it buds, it flowers beneath his sight;
And, in the middle, there is softly pightA golden butterfly; upon whose
There must be surely character'd strange things,
For with wide eye he wonders, and smiles oft. Lightly this little herald flew aloft,
Follow'd by glad Endymion's clasped hands:
Onward it flies.
From languor's sullen
His limbs are loos'd, and eager, on he
Dazzled to trace it in the sunny skies.
It seem'd he flew, the way so easy was;
And like a new-born spirit did he
Through the green evening quiet in the sun,
O'er many a heath, through many a woodland dun,
Through buried paths, where sleepy twilight
The summer time away.
One track unseamsA wooded cleft, and, far away, the
Of ocean fades upon him; then, anew,
He sinks adown a solitary glen,
Where there was never sound of mortal men,
Saving, perhaps, some snow-light
Melting to silence, when upon the
Some holy bark let forth an anthem sweet,
To cheer itself to Delphi.
Still his
Went swift beneath the merry-winged guide,
Until it reached a splashing fountain's
That, near a cavern's mouth, for ever
Unto the temperate air: then high it soar'd,
And, downward, suddenly began to dip,
As if, athirst with so much toil, 'twould
The crystal spout-head: so it did, with
Most delicate, as though afraid to
Even with mealy gold the waters clear.
But, at that very touch, to
So fairy-quick, was strange!
Bewildered,
Endymion sought around, and shook each
Of covert flowers in vain; and then he
Himself along the grass.
What gentle tongue,
What whisperer disturb'd his gloomy rest?
It was a nymph uprisen to the
In the fountain's pebbly margin, and she stood'Mong lilies, like the youngest of the brood.
To him her dripping hand she softly kist,
And anxiously began to plait and
Her ringlets round her fingers, saying: "Youth!
Too long, alas, hast thou starv'd on the ruth,
The bitterness of love: too long indeed,
Seeing thou art so gentle.
Could I
Thy soul of care, by heavens,
I would
All the bright riches of my crystal
To Amphitrite; all my clear-eyed fish,
Golden, or rainbow-sided, or purplish,
Vermilion-tail'd, or finn'd with silvery gauze;
Yea, or my veined pebble-floor, that drawsA virgin light to the deep; my
Tawny and gold, ooz'd slowly from far
By my diligent springs; my level lilies, shells,
My charming rod, my potent river spells;
Yes, every thing, even to the pearly
Meander gave me,—for I bubbled
To fainting creatures in a desert wild.
But woe is me,
I am but as a
To gladden thee; and all I dare to say,
Is, that I pity thee; that on this dayI've been thy guide; that thou must wander
In other regions, past the scanty
To mortal steps, before thou cans't be
From every wasting sigh, from every pain,
Into the gentle bosom of thy love.
Why it is thus, one knows in heaven above:
But, a poor Naiad,
I guess not.
Farewel!
I have a ditty for my hollow cell." Hereat, she vanished from Endymion's gaze,
Who brooded o'er the water in amaze:
The dashing fount pour'd on, and where its
Lay, half asleep, in grass and rushes cool,
Quick waterflies and gnats were sporting still,
And fish were dimpling, as if good nor
Had fallen out that hour.
The wanderer,
Holding his forehead, to keep off the
Of smothering fancies, patiently sat down;
And, while beneath the evening's sleepy
Glow-worms began to trim their starry lamps,
Thus breath'd he to himself: "Whoso
To take a fancied city of delight,
O what a wretch is he! and when 'tis his,
After long toil and travelling, to
The kernel of his hopes, how more than vile:
Yet, for him there's refreshment even in toil;
Another city doth he set about,
Free from the smallest pebble-bead of
That he will seize on trickling honey-combs:
Alas, he finds them dry; and then he foams,
And onward to another city speeds.
But this is human life: the war, the deeds,
The disappointment, the anxiety,
Imagination's struggles, far and nigh,
All human; bearing in themselves this good,
That they are sill the air, the subtle food,
To make us feel existence, and to
How quiet death is.
Where soil is men grow,
Whether to weeds or flowers; but for me,
There is no depth to strike in:
I can
Nought earthly worth my compassing; so
Upon a misty, jutting head of land—Alone?
No, no; and by the Orphean lute,
When mad Eurydice is listening to 't;
I'd rather stand upon this misty peak,
With not a thing to sigh for, or to seek,
But the soft shadow of my thrice-seen love,
Than be—I care not what.
O meekest
Of heaven!
O Cynthia, ten-times bright and fair!
From thy blue throne, now filling all the air,
Glance but one little beam of temper'd
Into my bosom, that the dreadful
And tyranny of love be somewhat scar'd!
Yet do not so, sweet queen; one torment spar'd,
Would give a pang to jealous misery,
Worse than the torment's self: but rather
Large wings upon my shoulders, and point
My love's far dwelling.
Though the playful
Of Cupids shun thee, too divine art thou,
Too keen in beauty, for thy silver
Not to have dipp'd in love's most gentle stream.
O be propitious, nor severely
My madness impious; for, by all the
That tend thy bidding,
I do think the
That kept my spirit in are burst—that
Am sailing with thee through the dizzy sky!
How beautiful thou art!
The world how deep!
How tremulous-dazzlingly the wheels
Around their axle!
Then these gleaming reins,
How lithe!
When this thy chariot
Is airy goal, haply some bower
Those twilight eyes?
Those eyes!—my spirit fails—Dear goddess, help! or the wide-gaping
Will gulph me—help!"—At this with madden'd stare,
And lifted hands, and trembling lips he stood;
Like old Deucalion mountain'd o'er the flood,
Or blind Orion hungry for the morn.
And, but from the deep cavern there was borneA voice, he had been froze to senseless stone;
Nor sigh of his, nor plaint, nor passion'd
Had more been heard.
Thus swell'd it forth: "Descend,
Young mountaineer! descend where alleys
Into the sparry hollows of the world!
Oft hast thou seen bolts of the thunder
As from thy threshold, day by day hast beenA little lower than the chilly
Of icy pinnacles, and dipp'dst thine
Into the deadening ether that still
Their marble being: now, as deep
As those are high, descend!
He ne'er is
With immortality, who fears to
Where airy voices lead: so through the hollow,
The silent mysteries of earth, descend!" He heard but the last words, nor could
One moment in reflection: for he
Into the fearful deep, to hide his
From the clear moon, the trees, and coming madness. 'Twas far too strange, and wonderful for sadness;
Sharpening, by degrees, his
To dive into the deepest.
Dark, nor light,
The region; nor bright, nor sombre wholly,
But mingled up; a gleaming melancholy;
A dusky empire and its diadems;
One faint eternal eventide of gems.
Aye, millions sparkled on a vein of gold,
Along whose track the prince quick footsteps told,
With all its lines abrupt and angular:
Out-shooting sometimes, like a meteor-star,
Through a vast antre; then the metal woof,
Like Vulcan's rainbow, with some monstrous
Curves hugely: now, far in the deep abyss,
It seems an angry lightning, and doth
Fancy into belief: anon it
Through winding passages, where sameness
Vexing conceptions of some sudden change;
Whether to silver grots, or giant
Of sapphire columns, or fantastic
Athwart a flood of crystal.
On a
Now fareth he, that o'er the vast
Towers like an ocean-cliff, and whence he seethA hundred waterfalls, whose voices
But as the murmuring surge.
Chilly and
His bosom grew, when first he, far away,
Descried an orbed diamond, set to
Old darkness from his throne: 'twas like the
Uprisen o'er chaos: and with such a
Came the amazement, that, absorb'd in it,
He saw not fiercer wonders—past the
Of any spirit to tell, but one of
Who, when this planet's sphering time doth close,
Will be its high remembrancers: who they?
The mighty ones who have made eternal
For Greece and England.
While
With deep-drawn sighs was quieting, he
Into a marble gallery, passing throughA mimic temple, so complete and
In sacred custom, that he well nigh
To search it inwards, whence far off appear'd,
Through a long pillar'd vista, a fair shrine,
And, just beyond, on light tiptoe divine,
A quiver'd Dian.
Stepping awfully,
The youth approach'd; oft turning his veil'd
Down sidelong aisles, and into niches old.
And when, more near against the marble
He had touch'd his forehead, he began to
All courts and passages, where silence
Rous'd by his whispering footsteps murmured faint:
And long he travers'd to and fro, to
Himself with every mystery, and awe;
Till, weary, he sat down before the
Of a wide outlet, fathomless and
To wild uncertainty and shadows grim.
There, when new wonders ceas'd to float before,
And thoughts of self came on, how crude and
The journey homeward to habitual self!
A mad-pursuing of the fog-born elf,
Whose flitting lantern, through rude nettle-briar,
Cheats us into a swamp, into a fire,
Into the bosom of a hated thing. What misery most drowningly doth
In lone Endymion's ear, now he has
The goal of consciousness?
Ah, 'tis the thought,
The deadly feel of solitude: for lo!
He cannot see the heavens, nor the
Of rivers, nor hill-flowers running
In pink and purple chequer, nor, up-pil'd,
The cloudy rack slow journeying in the west,
Like herded elephants; nor felt, nor
Cool grass, nor tasted the fresh slumberous air;
But far from such companionship to
An unknown time, surcharg'd with grief, away,
Was now his lot.
And must he patient stay,
Tracing fantastic figures with his spear?"No!" exclaimed he, "why should I tarry here?"No! loudly echoed times innumerable.
At which he straightway started, and 'gan
His paces back into the temple's chief;
Warming and glowing strong in the
Of help from Dian: so that when
He caught her airy form, thus did he plain,
Moving more near the while. "O Haunter
Of river sides, and woods, and heathy waste,
Where with thy silver bow and arrows
Art thou now forested?
O woodland Queen,
What smoothest air thy smoother forehead woos?
Where dost thou listen to the wide
Of thy disparted nymphs?
Through what dark
Glimmers thy crescent?
Wheresoe'er it be,'Tis in the breath of heaven: thou dost
Freedom as none can taste it, nor dost
Thy loveliness in dismal elements;
But, finding in our green earth sweet contents,
There livest blissfully.
Ah, if to
It feels Elysian, how rich to me,
An exil'd mortal, sounds its pleasant name!
Within my breast there lives a choking flame—O let me cool it among the zephyr-boughs!
A homeward fever parches up my tongue—O let me slake it at the running springs!
Upon my ear a noisy nothing rings—O let me once more hear the linnet's note!
Before mine eyes thick films and shadows float—O let me 'noint them with the heaven's light!
Dost thou now lave thy feet and ankles white?
O think how sweet to me the freshening sluice!
Dost thou now please thy thirst with berry-juice?
O think how this dry palate would rejoice!
If in soft slumber thou dost hear my voice,
Oh think how I should love a bed of flowers!—Young goddess! let me see my native bowers!
Deliver me from this rapacious deep!" Thus ending loudly, as he would
His destiny, alert he stood: but
Obstinate silence came heavily again,
Feeling about for its old couch of
And airy cradle, lowly bow'd his
Desponding, o'er the marble floor's cold thrill.
But 'twas not long; for, sweeter than the
To its old channel, or a swollen
To margin sallows, were the leaves he spied,
And flowers, and wreaths, and ready myrtle
Up heaping through the slab: refreshment
Itself, and strives its own delights to hide—Nor in one spot alone; the floral
In a long whispering birth enchanted
Before his footsteps; as when heav'd
Old ocean rolls a lengthened wave to the shore,
Down whose green back the short-liv'd foam, all hoar,
Bursts gradual, with a wayward indolence. Increasing still in heart, and pleasant sense,
Upon his fairy journey on he hastes;
So anxious for the end, he scarcely
One moment with his hand among the sweets:
Onward he goes—he stops—his bosom
As plainly in his ear, as the faint
Of which the throbs were born.
This still alarm,
This sleepy music, forc'd him walk tiptoe:
For it came more softly than the east could
Arion's magic to the Atlantic isles;
Or than the west, made jealous by the
Of thron'd Apollo, could breathe back the
To seas Ionian and Tyrian. O did he ever live, that lonely man,
Who lov'd—and music slew not? 'Tis the
Of love, that fairest joys give most unrest;
That things of delicate and tenderest
Are swallow'd all, and made a seared dearth,
By one consuming flame: it doth
And suffocate true blessings in a curse.
Half-happy, by comparison of bliss,
Is miserable. 'Twas even so with
Dew-dropping melody, in the Carian's ear;
First heaven, then hell, and then forgotten clear,
Vanish'd in elemental passion. And down some swart abysm he had gone,
Had not a heavenly guide benignant
To where thick myrtle branches, 'gainst his
Brushing, awakened: then the sounds
Went noiseless as a passing noontide
Over a bower, where little space he stood;
For as the sunset peeps into a
So saw he panting light, and towards it
Through winding alleys; and lo, wonderment!
Upon soft verdure saw, one here, one there,
Cupids a slumbering on their pinions fair. After a thousand mazes overgone,
At last, with sudden step, he came uponA chamber, myrtle wall'd, embowered high,
Full of light, incense, tender minstrelsy,
And more of beautiful and strange beside:
For on a silken couch of rosy pride,
In midst of all, there lay a sleeping
Of fondest beauty; fonder, in fair sooth,
Than sighs could fathom, or contentment reach:
And coverlids gold-tinted like the peach,
Or ripe October's faded marigolds,
Fell sleek about him in a thousand folds—Not hiding up an Apollonian
Of neck and shoulder, nor the tenting
Of knee from knee, nor ankles pointing light;
But rather, giving them to the filled
Officiously.
Sideway his face
On one white arm, and tenderly unclos'd,
By tenderest pressure, a faint damask
To slumbery pout; just as the morning
Disparts a dew-lipp'd rose.
Above his head,
Four lily stalks did their white honours
To make a coronal; and round him
All tendrils green, of every bloom and hue,
Together intertwin'd and trammel'd fresh:
The vine of glossy sprout; the ivy mesh,
Shading its Ethiop berries; and woodbine,
Of velvet leaves and bugle-blooms divine;
Convolvulus in streaked vases flush;
The creeper, mellowing for an autumn blush;
And virgin's bower, trailing airily;
With others of the sisterhood.
Hard by,
Stood serene Cupids watching silently.
One, kneeling to a lyre, touch'd the strings,
Muffling to death the pathos with his wings;
And, ever and anon, uprose to
At the youth's slumber; while another tookA willow-bough, distilling odorous dew,
And shook it on his hair; another
In through the woven roof, and
Rain'd violets upon his sleeping eyes. At these enchantments, and yet many more,
The breathless Latmian wonder'd o'er and o'er;
Until, impatient in embarrassment,
He forthright pass'd, and lightly treading
To that same feather'd lyrist, who straightway,
Smiling, thus whisper'd: "Though from upper
Thou art a wanderer, and thy presence
Might seem unholy, be of happy cheer!
For 'tis the nicest touch of human honour,
When some ethereal and high-favouring
Presents immortal bowers to mortal sense;
As now 'tis done to thee,
Endymion.
Was I in no wise startled.
So
Upon these living flowers.
Here is wine,
Alive with sparkles—never,
I aver,
Since Ariadne was a vintager,
So cool a purple: taste these juicy pears,
Sent me by sad Vertumnus, when his
Were high about Pomona: here is cream,
Deepening to richness from a snowy gleam;
Sweeter than that nurse Amalthea
For the boy Jupiter: and here,
By any touch, a bunch of blooming
Ready to melt between an infant's gums:
And here is manna pick'd from Syrian trees,
In starlight, by the three Hesperides.
Feast on, and meanwhile I will let thee
Of all these things around us." He did so,
Still brooding o'er the cadence of his lyre;
And thus: "I need not any hearing
By telling how the sea-born goddess
For a mortal youth, and how she strove to
Him all in all unto her doting self.
Who would not be so prison'd? but, fond elf,
He was content to let her amorous
Faint through his careless arms; content to
An unseiz'd heaven dying at his feet;
Content,
O fool! to make a cold retreat,
When on the pleasant grass such love, lovelorn,
Lay sorrowing; when every tear was
Of diverse passion; when her lips and
Were clos'd in sullen moisture, and quick
Came vex'd and pettish through her nostrils small.
Hush! no exclaim—yet, justly mightst thou
Curses upon his head.—I was half glad,
But my poor mistress went distract and mad,
When the boar tusk'd him: so away she
To Jove's high throne, and by her plainings
Immortal tear-drops down the thunderer's beard;
Whereon, it was decreed he should be
Each summer time to life.
Lo! this is he,
That same Adonis, safe in the
Of this still region all his winter-sleep.
Aye, sleep; for when our love-sick queen did
Over his waned corse, the tremulous
Heal'd up the wound, and, with a balmy power,
Medicined death to a lengthened drowsiness:
The which she fills with visions, and doth
In all this quiet luxury; and hath
Us young immortals, without any let,
To watch his slumber through. 'Tis well nigh pass'd,
Even to a moment's filling up, and
She scuds with summer breezes, to pant
The first long kiss, warm firstling, to
Embower'd sports in Cytherea's isle.
Look! how those winged listeners all this
Stand anxious: see! behold!"—This clamant
Broke through the careful silence; for they heardA rustling noise of leaves, and out there
Pigeons and doves:
Adonis something mutter'd,
The while one hand, that erst upon his
Lay dormant, mov'd convuls'd and
Up to his forehead.
Then there was a
Of sudden voices, echoing, "Come! come!
Arise! awake!
Clear summer has forth
Unto the clover-sward, and she has
Full soothingly to every nested finch:
Rise,
Cupids! or we'll give the blue-bell
To your dimpled arms.
Once more sweet life begin!"At this, from every side they hurried in,
Rubbing their sleepy eyes with lazy wrists,
And doubling overhead their little
In backward yawns.
But all were soon alive:
For as delicious wine doth, sparkling,
In nectar'd clouds and curls through water fair,
So from the arbour roof down swell'd an
Odorous and enlivening; making
To laugh, and play, and sing, and loudly
For their sweet queen: when lo! the wreathed
Disparted, and far upward could be
Blue heaven, and a silver car, air-borne,
Whose silent wheels, fresh wet from clouds of morn,
Spun off a drizzling dew,—which falling
On soft Adonis' shoulders, made him
Nestle and turn uneasily about.
Soon were the white doves plain, with necks stretch'd out,
And silken traces lighten'd in descent;
And soon, returning from love's banishment,
Queen Venus leaning downward open arm'd:
Her shadow fell upon his breast, and charm'dA tumult to his heart, and a new
Into his eyes.
Ah, miserable strife,
But for her comforting! unhappy sight,
But meeting her blue orbs!
Who, who can
Of these first minutes?
The unchariest
To embracements warm as theirs makes coy excuse. O it has ruffled every spirit there,
Saving love's self, who stands superb to
The general gladness: awfully he stands;
A sovereign quell is in his waving hands;
No sight can bear the lightning of his bow;
His quiver is mysterious, none can
What themselves think of it; from forth his
There darts strange light of varied hues and dyes:
A scowl is sometimes on his brow, but
Look full upon it feel anon the
Of his fair eyes run liquid through their souls.
Endymion feels it, and no more
The burning prayer within him; so, bent low,
He had begun a plaining of his woe.
But Venus, bending forward, said: "My child,
Favour this gentle youth; his days are
With love—he—but alas! too well I
Thou know'st the deepness of his misery.
Ah, smile not so, my son:
I tell thee true,
That when through heavy hours I used to
The endless sleep of this new-born Adon',
This stranger ay I pitied.
For uponA dreary morning once I fled
Into the breezy clouds, to weep and
For this my love: for vexing Mars had
Me even to tears: thence, when a little eas'd,
Down-looking, vacant, through a hazy wood,
I saw this youth as he despairing stood:
Those same dark curls blown vagrant in the wind:
Those same full fringed lids a constant
Over his sullen eyes:
I saw him
Himself on wither'd leaves, even as
Death had come sudden; for no jot he mov'd,
Yet mutter'd wildly.
I could hear he
Some fair immortal, and that his
Had zoned her through the night.
There is no
Of this in heaven:
I have mark'd each cheek,
And find it is the vainest thing to seek;
And that of all things 'tis kept secretest.
Endymion! one day thou wilt be blest:
So still obey the guiding hand that
Thee safely through these wonders for sweet ends.'Tis a concealment needful in extreme;
And if I guess'd not so, the sunny
Thou shouldst mount up to with me.
Now adieu!
Here must we leave thee."—At these words up
The impatient doves, up rose the floating car,
Up went the hum celestial.
High
The Latmian saw them minish into nought;
And, when all were clear vanish'd, still he caughtA vivid lightning from that dreadful bow.
When all was darkened, with Etnean
The earth clos'd—gave a solitary moan—And left him once again in twilight lone. He did not rave, he did not stare aghast,
For all those visions were o'ergone, and past,
And he in loneliness: he felt
Of happy times, when all he had
Would seem a feather to the mighty prize.
So, with unusual gladness, on he
Through caves, and palaces of mottled ore,
Gold dome, and crystal wall, and turquois floor,
Black polish'd porticos of awful shade,
And, at the last, a diamond balustrade,
Leading afar past wild magnificence,
Spiral through ruggedest loopholes, and
Stretching across a void, then guiding
Enormous chasms, where, all foam and roar,
Streams subterranean tease their granite beds;
Then heighten'd just above the silvery
Of a thousand fountains, so that he could
The waters with his spear; but at the splash,
Done heedlessly, those spouting columns
Sudden a poplar's height, and 'gan to
His diamond path with fretwork, streaming
Alive, and dazzling cool, and with a sound,
Haply, like dolphin tumults, when sweet
Welcome the float of Thetis.
Long he
On this delight; for, every minute's space,
The streams with changed magic interlace:
Sometimes like delicatest lattices,
Cover'd with crystal vines; then weeping trees,
Moving about as in a gentle wind,
Which, in a wink, to watery gauze refin'd,
Pour'd into shapes of curtain'd canopies,
Spangled, and rich with liquid
Of flowers, peacocks, swans, and naiads fair.
Swifter than lightning went these wonders rare;
And then the water, into stubborn
Collecting, mimick'd the wrought oaken beams,
Pillars, and frieze, and high fantastic roof,
Of those dusk places in times far
Cathedrals call'd.
He bade a loth
To these founts Protean, passing gulph, and dell,
And torrent, and ten thousand jutting shapes,
Half seen through deepest gloom, and griesly gapes,
Blackening on every side, and overheadA vaulted dome like Heaven's, far
With starlight gems: aye, all so huge and strange,
The solitary felt a hurried
Working within him into something dreary,—Vex'd like a morning eagle, lost, and weary,
And purblind amid foggy, midnight wolds.
But he revives at once: for who
New sudden things, nor casts his mental slough?
Forth from a rugged arch, in the dusk below,
Came mother Cybele! alone—alone—In sombre chariot; dark foldings
About her majesty, and front death-pale,
With turrets crown'd.
Four maned lions
The sluggish wheels; solemn their toothed maws,
Their surly eyes brow-hidden, heavy
Uplifted drowsily, and nervy
Cowering their tawny brushes.
Silent
This shadowy queen athwart, and faints
In another gloomy arch. Wherefore delay,
Young traveller, in such a mournful place?
Art thou wayworn, or canst not further
The diamond path?
And does it indeed
Abrupt in middle air?
Yet earthward
Thy forehead, and to Jupiter
Call ardently!
He was indeed wayworn;
Abrupt, in middle air, his way was lost;
To cloud-borne Jove he bowed, and there
Towards him a large eagle, 'twixt whose wings,
Without one impious word, himself he flings,
Committed to the darkness and the gloom:
Down, down, uncertain to what pleasant doom,
Swift as a fathoming plummet down he
Through unknown things; till exhaled asphodel,
And rose, with spicy fannings interbreath'd,
Came swelling forth where little caves were
So thick with leaves and mosses, that they
Large honey-combs of green, and freshly
With airs delicious.
In the greenest
The eagle landed him, and farewel took. It was a jasmine bower, all
With golden moss.
His every sense had
Ethereal for pleasure; 'bove his
Flew a delight half-graspable; his
Was Hesperèan; to his capable
Silence was music from the holy spheres;
A dewy luxury was in his eyes;
The little flowers felt his pleasant
And stirr'd them faintly.
Verdant cave and
He wander'd through, oft wondering at such
Of sudden exaltation: but, "Alas!
Said he, "will all this gush of feeling
Away in solitude?
And must they wane,
Like melodies upon a sandy plain,
Without an echo?
Then shall I be
So sad, so melancholy, so bereft!
Yet still I feel immortal!
O my love,
My breath of life, where art thou?
High above,
Dancing before the morning gates of heaven?
Or keeping watch among those starry seven,
Old Atlas' children?
Art a maid of the waters,
One of shell-winding Triton's bright-hair'd daughters?
Or art, impossible! a nymph of Dian's,
Weaving a coronal of tender
For very idleness?
Where'er thou art,
Methinks it now is at my will to
Into thine arms; to scare Aurora's train,
And snatch thee from the morning; o'er the
To scud like a wild bird, and take thee
From thy sea-foamy cradle; or to
Thy shepherd vest, and woo thee mid fresh leaves.
No, no, too eagerly my soul
Its powerless self:
I know this cannot be.
O let me then by some sweet dreaming
To her entrancements: hither sleep awhile!
Hither most gentle sleep! and soothing
For some few hours the coming solitude." Thus spake he, and that moment felt
With power to dream deliciously; so
Through a dim passage, searching till he
The smoothest mossy bed and deepest,
He threw himself, and just into the
Stretching his indolent arms, he took,
O bliss!
A naked waist: "Fair Cupid, whence is this?"A well-known voice sigh'd, "Sweetest, here am I!"At which soft ravishment, with doating
They trembled to each other.—Helicon!
O fountain'd hill!
Old Homer's Helicon!
That thou wouldst spout a little streamlet
These sorry pages; then the verse would
And sing above this gentle pair, like
Over his nested young: but all is
Around thine aged top, and thy clear
Exhales in mists to heaven.
Aye, the
Of mighty Poets is made up; the
Is folded by the Muses; the bright
Is in Apollo's hand: our dazed
Have seen a new tinge in the western skies:
The world has done its duty.
Yet, oh yet,
Although the sun of poesy is set,
These lovers did embrace, and we must
That there is no old power left to steepA quill immortal in their joyous tears.
Long time in silence did their anxious
Question that thus it was; long time they
Fondling and kissing every doubt away;
Long time ere soft caressing sobs
To mellow into words, and then there
Two bubbling springs of talk from their sweet lips."O known Unknown! from whom my being
Such darling essence, wherefore may I
Be ever in these arms? in this sweet
Pillow my chin for ever? ever
These toying hands and kiss their smooth excess?
Why not for ever and for ever
That breath about my eyes?
Ah, thou wilt
Away from me again, indeed, indeed—Thou wilt be gone away, and wilt not
My lonely madness.
Speak, my kindest fair!
Is—is it to be so?
No!
Who will
To pluck thee from me?
And, of thine own will,
Full well I feel thou wouldst not leave me.
Let me entwine thee surer,
How can we part?
Elysium! who art thou?
Who, that thou canst not be for ever here,
Or lift me with thee to some starry sphere?
Enchantress! tell me by this soft embrace,
By the most soft completion of thy face,
Those lips,
O slippery blisses, twinkling eyes,
And by these tenderest, milky sovereignties—These tenderest, and by the nectar-wine,
The passion"————"O lov'd Ida the divine!
Endymion! dearest!
Ah, unhappy me!
His soul will 'scape us—O felicity!
How he does love me!
His poor temples
To the very tune of love—how sweet, sweet, sweet.
Revive, dear youth, or I shall faint and die;
Revive, or these soft hours will hurry
In tranced dulness; speak, and let that
Affright this lethargy!
I cannot
Its heavy pressure, and will press at
My lips to thine, that they may richly
Until we taste the life of love again.
What! dost thou move? dost kiss?
O bliss!
O pain!
I love thee, youth, more than I can conceive;
And so long absence from thee doth
My soul of any rest: yet must I hence:
Yet, can I not to starry
Uplift thee; nor for very shame can
Myself to thee.
Ah, dearest, do not
Or thou wilt force me from this secrecy,
And I must blush in heaven.
O that
Had done it already; that the dreadful
At my lost brightness, my impassion'd wiles,
Had waned from Olympus' solemn height,
And from all serious Gods; that our
Was quite forgotten, save of us alone!
And wherefore so ashamed? 'Tis but to
For endless pleasure, by some coward blushes:
Yet must I be a coward!—Horror
Too palpable before me—the sad
Of Jove—Minerva's start—no bosom
With awe of purity—no Cupid
In reverence veiled—my crystaline
Half lost, and all old hymns made nullity!
But what is this to love?
O I could
With thee into the ken of heavenly powers,
So thou wouldst thus, for many sequent hours,
Press me so sweetly.
Now I swear at
That I am wise, that Pallas is a dunce—Perhaps her love like mine is but unknown—O I do think that I have been
In chastity: yes,
Pallas has been sighing,
While every eve saw me my hair
With fingers cool as aspen leaves.
Sweet love,
I was as vague as solitary dove,
Nor knew that nests were built.
Now a soft kiss—Aye, by that kiss,
I vow an endless bliss,
An immortality of passion's thine:
Ere long I will exalt thee to the
Of heaven ambrosial; and we will
Ourselves whole summers by a river glade;
And I will tell thee stories of the sky,
And breathe thee whispers of its minstrelsy.
My happy love will overwing all bounds!
O let me melt into thee; let the
Of our close voices marry at their birth;
Let us entwine hoveringly—O
Of human words! roughness of mortal speech!
Lispings empyrean will I sometime
Thine honied tongue—lute-breathings, which I
To have thee understand, now while I
Thee thus, and weep for fondness—I am pain'd,
Endymion: woe! woe! is grief
In the very deeps of pleasure, my sole life?"—Hereat, with many sobs, her gentle
Melted into a languor.
He
Entranced vows and tears. Ye who have
With too much passion, will here stay and pity,
For the mere sake of truth; as 'tis a
Not of these days, but long ago 'twas
By a cavern wind unto a forest old;
And then the forest told it in a
To a sleeping lake, whose cool and level gleamA poet caught as he was
To Phoebus' shrine; and in it he did
His weary limbs, bathing an hour's space,
And after, straight in that inspired
He sang the story up into the air,
Giving it universal freedom.
Has it been ever sounding for those
Whose tips are glowing hot.
The legend
Yon centinel stars; and he who listens to
Must surely be self-doomed or he will rue it:
For quenchless burnings come upon the heart,
Made fiercer by a fear lest any
Should be engulphed in the eddying wind.
As much as here is penn'd doth always findA resting place, thus much comes clear and plain;
Anon the strange voice is upon the wane—And 'tis but echo'd from departing sound,
That the fair visitant at last
Her gentle limbs, and left the youth asleep.—Thus the tradition of the gusty deep. Now turn we to our former chroniclers.—Endymion awoke, that grief of
Sweet paining on his ear: he sickly
How lone he was once more, and sadly
His empty arms together, hung his head,
And most forlorn upon that widow'd
Sat silently.
Love's madness he had known:
Often with more than tortured lion's
Moanings had burst from him; but now that
Had pass'd away: no longer did he wageA rough-voic'd war against the dooming stars.
No, he had felt too much for such harsh jars:
The lyre of his soul Eolian
Forgot all violence, and but
With melancholy thought:
O he had
Drunken from pleasure's nipple; and his
Henceforth was dove-like.—Loth was he to
From the imprinted couch, and when he did,'Twas with slow, languid paces, and face
In muffling hands.
So temper'd, out he
Half seeing visions that might have
Alecto's serpents; ravishments more
Than Hermes' pipe, when anxious he did
Over eclipsing eyes: and at the
It was a sounding grotto, vaulted, vast,
O'er studded with a thousand, thousand pearls,
And crimson mouthed shells with stubborn curls,
Of every shape and size, even to the
In which whales arbour close, to brood and
Against an endless storm.
Moreover too,
Fish-semblances, of green and azure hue,
Ready to snort their streams.
In this cool
Endymion sat down, and 'gan to
On all his life: his youth, up to the
When 'mid acclaim, and feasts, and garlands gay,
He stept upon his shepherd throne: the
Of his white palace in wild forest nook,
And all the revels he had lorded there:
Each tender maiden whom he once thought fair,
With every friend and fellow-woodlander—Pass'd like a dream before him.
Then the
Of the old bards to mighty deeds: his
To nurse the golden age 'mong shepherd clans:
That wondrous night: the great Pan-festival:
His sister's sorrow; and his wanderings all,
Until into the earth's deep maw he rush'd:
Then all its buried magic, till it
High with excessive love. "And now," thought he,"How long must I remain in
Of blank amazements that amaze no more?
Now I have tasted her sweet soul to the
All other depths are shallow: essences,
Once spiritual, are like muddy lees,
Meant but to fertilize my earthly root,
And make my branches lift a golden
Into the bloom of heaven: other light,
Though it be quick and sharp enough to
The Olympian eagle's vision, is dark,
Dark as the parentage of chaos.
Hark!
My silent thoughts are echoing from these shells;
Or they are but the ghosts, the dying
Of noises far
He kept an anxious ear.
The humming
Came louder, and behold, there as he lay,
On either side outgush'd, with misty spray,
A copious spring; and both together
Swift, mad, fantastic round the rocks, and
Among the conchs and shells of the lofty grot,
Leaving a trickling dew.
At last they
Down from the ceiling's height, pouring a
As of some breathless racers whose hopes
Upon the last few steps, and with spent
Along the ground they took a winding course.
Endymion follow'd—for it seem'd that
Ever pursued, the other strove to shun—Follow'd their languid mazes, till well
He had left thinking of the mystery,—And was now rapt in tender
Over the vanish'd bliss.
Ah! what is it
His dream away?
What melodies are these?
They sound as through the whispering of trees,
Not native in such barren vaults.
Give ear! "O Arethusa, peerless nymph! why
Such tenderness as mine?
Great Dian, why,
Why didst thou hear her prayer?
O that
Were rippling round her dainty fairness now,
Circling about her waist, and striving
To entice her to a dive! then stealing
Between her luscious lips and eyelids thin.
O that her shining hair was in the sun,
And I distilling from it thence to
In amorous rillets down her shrinking form!
To linger on her lily shoulders,
Between her kissing breasts, and every
Touch raptur'd!—See how painfully I flow:
Fair maid, be pitiful to my great woe.
Stay, stay thy weary course, and let me lead,
A happy wooer, to the flowery
Where all that beauty snar'd me."—"Cruel god,
Desist! or my offended mistress'
Will stagnate all thy fountains:—tease me
With syren words—Ah, have I really
Such power to madden thee?
And is it true—Away, away, or I shall dearly
My very thoughts: in mercy then away,
Kindest Alpheus for should I
My own dear will, 'twould be a deadly bane."—"O,
Oread-Queen! would that thou hadst a
Like this of mine, then would I fearless
And be a criminal."—"Alas,
I burn,
I shudder—gentle river, get thee hence.
Alpheus! thou enchanter! every
Of mine was once made perfect in these woods.
Fresh breezes, bowery lawns, and innocent floods,
Ripe fruits, and lonely couch, contentment gave;
But ever since I heedlessly did
In thy deceitful stream, a panting
Grew strong within me: wherefore serve me so,
And call it love?
Alas, 'twas cruelty.
Not once more did I close my happy
Amid the thrush's song.
Away!
Avaunt!
O 'twas a cruel thing."—"Now thou dost
So softly,
Arethusa, that I
If thou wast playing on my shady brink,
Thou wouldst bathe once again.
Innocent maid!
Stifle thine heart no more;—nor be
Of angry powers: there are
Will shade us with their wings.
Those fitful sighs'Tis almost death to hear:
O let me pourA dewy balm upon them!—fear no more,
Sweet Arethusa!
Dian's self must
Sometimes these very pangs.
Dear maiden,
Blushing into my soul, and let us
These dreary caverns for the open sky.
I will delight thee all my winding course,
From the green sea up to my hidden
About Arcadian forests; and will
The channels where my coolest waters
Through mossy rocks; where, 'mid exuberant green,
I roam in pleasant darkness, more
Than Saturn in his exile; where I
Round flowery islands, and take thence a
Of mealy sweets, which myriads of
Buzz from their honied wings: and thou shouldst
Thyself to choose the richest, where we
Be incense-pillow'd every summer night.
Doff all sad fears, thou white deliciousness,
And let us be thus comforted;
Thou couldst rejoice to see my hopeless
Hurry distracted from Sol's temperate beam,
And pour to death along some hungry sands."—"What can I do,
Alpheus?
Dian
Severe before me: persecuting fate!
Unhappy Arethusa! thou wast lateA huntress free in"—At this, sudden
Those two sad streams adown a fearful dell.
The Latmian listen'd, but he heard no more,
Save echo, faint repeating o'er and
The name of Arethusa.
On the
Of that dark gulph he wept, and said: "I
Thee, gentle Goddess of my pilgrimage,
By our eternal hopes, to soothe, to assuage,
If thou art powerful, these lovers pains;
And make them happy in some happy plains. He turn'd—there was a whelming sound—he stept,
There was a cooler light; and so he
Towards it by a sandy path, and lo!
More suddenly than doth a moment go,
The visions of the earth were gone and fled—He saw the giant sea above his head.(line 31):
The reference is of course not to the story of Hero and Leander but to the tears of Hero in Much Ado About Nothing, shed when she was falsely accused; and Imogen must, equally of course, be Shakespeare's heroine in Cymbeline, though she is not the only Imogen of fiction who has swooned.
For Pastorella see Faerie Queene,
Book VI,
Canto II, stanza I. et seq.(line 168):
For the three occasions which Endymion had seen Diana, refer to the account given to Peona; beginning with line 540,
Book I, -- to the passage about the well, line 896,
Book I, -- and to the passage in which he hurried into the grotto, line 971,
Book I.(line 430):
In the draft,
Endymion was described as The mortal Latmian.(line 434):
It was a peculiarly happy piece of poetic realism to translate Ariadne's relations with Bacchus into her becoming a vintager; and I presume this was Keats's own thought, as well as the idea immediately following, that the God of Orchards conciliated Love with a gift of pears when paying his addresses to Pomona.(line 676) Hesperèan,
I presume, not Hespèrean as invariably accented by Milton.
The precise value of 'capable' as used here is of course regulated by past and not by present custom.
In this case it simply stands for receptive, able to receive, as in Hamlet (Act
II,
Scene IV). (lines 689-92) Endymion conjectures whether his unknown love is one of the Hours, or one of the nymph Pleione's daughters by Atlas, transferred to heaven as the Pleiades.~ Poetical Works of John Keats, ed.
H.
Buxton Forman,
Crowell publ. 1895.
