Darkness

I had a dream, which was not all a dream.

The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the

Did wander darkling in the eternal space,

Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth    Swung blind and blackening in the moon­less air;

Morn came and went--and came, and brought no day,

And men forgot their passions in the

Of this their desolation; and all

Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light:    And they did live by watchfires--and the thrones,

The palaces of crowned kings--the huts,

The habitations of all things which dwell,

Were burnt for beacons; cities were consumed,

And men were gather'd round their blazing

To look once more into each other's face;    Happy were those who dwelt within the

Of the volcanos, and their mountain-torch:

A fearful hope was all the world contain'd;

Forests were set on fire--but hour by hour    They fell and faded--and the crackling

Extinguish'd with a crash--and all was black.

The brows of men by the despairing

Wore an unearthly aspect, as by

The flashes fell upon them; some lay down    And hid their eyes and wept; and some did

Their chins upon their clenched hands, and smiled;

And others hurried to and fro, and

Their funeral piles with fuel, and look'd

With mad disquietude on the dull sky,

The pall of a past world; and then

With curses cast them down upon the dust,

And gnash'd their teeth and howl'd: the wild birds

And, terrified, did flutter on the ground,

And flap their useless wings; the wildest

Came tame and tremulous; and vipers

And twined themselves among the multitude,

Hissing, but stingless--were slain for food.

And War, which for a moment was no more,

Did glut himself again:--a meal was

With blood, and each sate sullenly

Gorging himself in gloom: no love was left;

All earth was but one thought--and that was

Immediate and inglorious; and the

Of famine fed upon all

Died, and their bones were tombless as their flesh;

The meagre by the meagre were devour'd,

Even dogs assail'd their masters, all save one,

And he was faithful to a Gorse, and

The birds and beasts and famish'd men at bay,  Till hunger clung them, or the dropping

Lured their lank jaws; himself sought out no food,

But with a piteous and perpetual moan,

And a quick desolate cry, licking the

Which answer'd not with a caress--he died.

The crowd was famish'd by degrees; but

Of an enormous city did survive,

And they were enemies: they met

The dying embers of an

Where had been heap'd a mass of holy

For an unholy usage; they raked up,

And shivering scraped with their cold skeleton

The feeble ashes, and their feeble

Blew for a little life, and made a

Which was a mockery; then they lifted

Their eyes as it grew lighter, and beheld  Each other's aspects--saw, and shriek'd, and died--Even of their mutual hideousness

Unknowing who he was upon whose

Famine had written Fiend.

The world was void,  The populous and the powerful was a lump,

Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, lifeless,

A lump of death--a chaos of hard clay.

The rivers, lakes, and ocean all stood still,

And nothing stirr'd within their silent depths;

Ships sailorless lay rotting on the sea,

And their masts fell down piecemeal: as they

They slept on the abyss without a

The waves were dead; the tides were in their grave,

The moon, their mistress, had expired before;

The winds were wither'd in the stagnant air,

And the clouds perish'd;

Darkness had no

Of aid from them--She was the Universe.

Diodati,

July 1816.