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       These uttering lips, while I in calm speech tell

       How specious heaven was changed to real hell.

      “One morn she left me sleeping: half awake I sought for her smooth arms and lips, to slake

       My greedy thirst with nectarous camel-draughts;

       But she was gone. Whereat the barbed shafts

       Of disappointment stuck in me so sore,

       That out I ran and search’d the forest o’er.

       Wandering about in pine and cedar gloom

       Damp awe assail’d me; for there ‘gan to boom

       A sound of moan, an agony of sound,

       Sepulchral from the distance all around.

       Then came a conquering earth-thunder, and rumbled That fierce complain to silence: while I stumbled

       Down a precipitous path, as if impell’d.

       I came to a dark valley.–Groanings swell’d

       Poisonous about my ears, and louder grew,

       The nearer I approach’d a flame’s gaunt blue,

       That glar’d before me through a thorny brake.

       This fire, like the eye of gordian snake,

       Bewitch’d me towards; and I soon was near

       A sight too fearful for the feel of fear:

       In thicket hid I curs’d the haggard scene– The banquet of my arms, my arbour queen,

       Seated upon an uptorn forest root;

       And all around her shapes, wizard and brute,

       Laughing, and wailing, groveling, serpenting,

       Shewing tooth, tusk, and venom-bag, and sting!

       O such deformities! Old Charon’s self,

       Should he give up awhile his penny pelf,

       And take a dream ‘mong rushes Stygian,

       It could not be so phantasied. Fierce, wan,

       And tyrannizing was the lady’s look, As over them a gnarled staff she shook.

       Ofttimes upon the sudden she laugh’d out,

       And from a basket emptied to the rout

       Clusters of grapes, the which they raven’d quick

       And roar’d for more; with many a hungry lick

       About their shaggy jaws. Avenging, slow,

       Anon she took a branch of mistletoe,

       And emptied on’t a black dull-gurgling phial:

       Groan’d one and all, as if some piercing trial

       Was sharpening for their pitiable bones. She lifted up the charm: appealing groans

       From their poor breasts went sueing to her ear

       In vain; remorseless as an infant’s bier

       She whisk’d against their eyes the sooty oil.

       Whereat was heard a noise of painful toil,

       Increasing gradual to a tempest rage,

       Shrieks, yells, and groans of torture-pilgrimage;

       Until their grieved bodies ‘gan to bloat

       And puff from the tail’s end to stifled throat:

       Then was appalling silence: then a sight More wildering than all that hoarse affright;

       For the whole herd, as by a whirlwind writhen,

       Went through the dismal air like one huge Python

       Antagonizing Boreas,–and so vanish’d.

       Yet there was not a breath of wind: she banish’d

       These phantoms with a nod. Lo! from the dark

       Came waggish fauns, and nymphs, and satyrs stark,

       With dancing and loud revelry,–and went

       Swifter than centaurs after rapine bent.–

       Sighing an elephant appear’d and bow’d Before the fierce witch, speaking thus aloud

       In human accent: “Potent goddess! chief

       Of pains resistless! make my being brief,

       Or let me from this heavy prison fly:

       Or give me to the air, or let me die!

       I sue not for my happy crown again;

       I sue not for my phalanx on the plain;

       I sue not for my lone, my widow’d wife;

       I sue not for my ruddy drops of life,

       My children fair, my lovely girls and boys! I will forget them; I will pass these joys;

       Ask nought so heavenward, so too–too high:

       Only I pray, as fairest boon, to die,

       Or be deliver’d from this cumbrous flesh,

       From this gross, detestable, filthy mesh,

       And merely given to the cold bleak air.

       Have mercy, Goddess! Circe, feel my prayer!”

      That curst magician’s name fell icy numb

       Upon my wild conjecturing: truth had come

       Naked and sabre-like against my heart. I saw a fury whetting a death-dart;

       And my slain spirit, overwrought with fright,

       Fainted away in that dark lair of night.

       Think, my deliverer, how desolate

       My waking must have been! disgust, and hate,

       And terrors manifold divided me

       A spoil amongst them. I prepar’d to flee

       Into the dungeon core of that wild wood:

       I fled three days–when lo! before me stood

       Glaring the angry witch. O Dis, even now, A clammy dew is beading on my brow,

       At mere remembering her pale laugh, and curse.

       “Ha! ha! Sir Dainty! there must be a nurse

       Made of rose leaves and thistledown, express,

       To cradle thee my sweet, and lull thee: yes,

       I am too flinty-hard for thy nice touch:

       My tenderest squeeze is but a giant’s clutch.

       So, fairy-thing, it shall have lullabies

       Unheard of yet; and it shall still its cries

       Upon some breast more lily-feminine. Oh, no–it shall not pine, and pine, and pine

       More than one pretty, trifling thousand years;

       And then ‘twere pity, but fate’s gentle shears

       Cut short its immortality. Sea-flirt!

       Young dove of the waters! truly I’ll not hurt

       One hair of thine: see how I weep and sigh,

       That our heart-broken parting is so nigh.

       And must we part? Ah, yes, it must be so.

       Yet ere thou leavest me in utter woe,

       Let me sob over thee my last adieus, And speak a blessing: Mark me! Thou hast thews

       Immortal, for thou art of heavenly race:

       But such a love is mine, that here I chase

       Eternally away from thee all bloom

       Of youth, and destine thee towards a tomb.

       Hence shalt thou quickly to the watery vast;

       And there, ere many days be overpast,

       Disabled age shall

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