Selected Poetry and Prose. Percy Bysshe Shelley

drops quench kisses till they burn again.

      And we will talk, until thought’s melody

      Become too sweet for utterance, and it die

      In words, to live again in looks, which dart

      With thrilling tone into the voiceless heart,

      Harmonizing silence without a sound.

      Our breath shall intermix, our bosoms bound,

      And our veins beat together; and our lips

      With other eloquence than words, eclipse

      The soul that burns between them, and the wells

      Which boil under our being’s inmost cells,

      The fountains of our deepest life, shall be

      Confused in Passion’s golden purity,

      As mountain-springs under the morning sun.

      We shall become the same, we shall be one

      Spirit within two frames, oh! wherefore two?

      One passion in twin-hearts, which grows and grew,

      Till like two meteors of expanding flame,

      Those spheres instinct with it become the same,

      Touch, mingle, are transfigured; ever still

      Burning, yet ever inconsumable:

      In one another’s substance finding food,

      Like flames too pure and light and unimbued

      To nourish their bright lives with baser prey,

      Which point to Heaven and cannot pass away:

      One hope within two wills, one will beneath

      Two overshadowing minds, one life, one death,

      One Heaven, one Hell, one immortality,

      And one annihilation. Woe is me!

      The winged words on which my soul would pierce

      Into the height of Love’s rare Universe,

      Are chains of lead around its flight of fire—

      I pant, I sink, I tremble, I expire!

      ———

      Weak Verses, go, kneel at your Sovereign’s feet,

      And say:—‘We are the masters of thy slave;

      What wouldest thou with us and ours and thine?’

      Then call your sisters from Oblivion’s cave,

      All singing loud: ‘Love’s very pain is sweet,

      But its reward is in the world divine

      Which, if not here, it builds beyond the grave.’

      So shall ye live when I am there. Then haste

      Over the hearts of men, until ye meet

      Marina, Vanna, Primus, and the rest,

      And bid them love each other and be blessed:

      And leave the troop which errs, and which reproves,

      And come and be my guest,—for I am Love’s.

      EPITHALAMIUM

      Boys Sing.

      Night! with all thine eyes look down!

      Darkness! weep thy holiest dew!

      Never smiled the inconstant moon

      On a pair so true.

      Haste, coy hour! and quench all light,

      Lest eyes see their own delight!

      Haste, swift hour! and thy loved flight

      Oft renew!

      Girls Sing.

      Fairies, sprites, and angels, keep her!

      Holy stars! permit no wrong!

      And return, to wake the sleeper,

      Dawn, ere it be long!

      O joy! O fear! there is not one

      Of us can guess what may be done

      In the absence of the sun:—

      Come along!

      Boys.

      Oh! linger long, thou envious eastern lamp

      In the damp

      Caves of the deep!

      Girls.

      Nay, return, Vesper! urge thy lazy car!

      Swift unbar

      The gates of Sleep!

      Chorus.

      The golden gate of Sleep unbar,

      When Strength and Beauty, met together,

      Kindle their image, like a star

      In a sea of glassy weather.

      May the purple mist of love

      Round them rise, and with them move,

      Nourishing each tender gem

      Which, like flowers, will burst from them.

      As the fruit is to the tree

      May their children ever be!

      EVENING, PONTE AL MARE, PISA

      I.

      The sun is set; the swallows are asleep;

      The bats are flitting fast in the gray air;

      The slow soft toads out of damp corners creep,

      And evening’s breath, wandering here and there

      Over the quivering surface of the stream,

      Wakes not one ripple from its summer dream.

      II.

      There is no dew on the dry grass to-night,

      Nor damp within the shadow of the trees;

      The wind is intermitting, dry, and light;

      And in the inconstant motion of the breeze

      The dust and straws are driven up and down,

      And whirled about the pavement of the town.

      III.

      Within the surface of the fleeting river

      The wrinkled image of the city lay,

      Immovably unquiet, and forever

      It trembles, but it never fades away;

      Go to the...

      You, being changed, will find it then as now.

      IV.

      The chasm in which the sun has sunk is shut

      By darkest barriers of cinereous cloud,

      Like mountain over mountain huddled—but

      Growing and moving upwards in a crowd,

      And over it a space of watery blue,

      Which the keen evening star is shining through.

      EYES: A FRAGMENT

      How eloquent are eyes!

      Not