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richness never quaft

       In her maternal longing. Happy gloom! Dark Paradise! where pale becomes the bloom

       Of health by due; where silence dreariest

       Is most articulate; where hopes infest;

       Where those eyes are the brightest far that keep

       Their lids shut longest in a dreamless sleep.

       O happy spirit-home! O wondrous soul!

       Pregnant with such a den to save the whole

       In thine own depth. Hail, gentle Carian!

       For, never since thy griefs and woes began,

       Hast thou felt so content: a grievous feud Hath let thee to this Cave of Quietude.

       Aye, his lull’d soul was there, although upborne

       With dangerous speed: and so he did not mourn

       Because he knew not whither he was going.

       So happy was he, not the aerial blowing

       Of trumpets at clear parley from the east

       Could rouse from that fine relish, that high feast.

       They stung the feather’d horse: with fierce alarm

       He flapp’d towards the sound. Alas, no charm

       Could lift Endymion’s head, or he had view’d A skyey mask, a pinion’d multitude,–

       And silvery was its passing: voices sweet

       Warbling the while as if to lull and greet

       The wanderer in his path. Thus warbled they,

       While past the vision went in bright array.

      “Who, who from Dian’s feast would be away?

       For all the golden bowers of the day

       Are empty left? Who, who away would be

       From Cynthia’s wedding and festivity?

       Not Hesperus: lo! upon his silver wings He leans away for highest heaven and sings,

       Snapping his lucid fingers merrily!–

       Ah, Zephyrus! art here, and Flora too!

       Ye tender bibbers of the rain and dew,

       Young playmates of the rose and daffodil,

       Be careful, ere ye enter in, to fill

       Your baskets high

       With fennel green, and balm, and golden pines,

       Savory, latter-mint, and columbines,

       Cool parsley, basil sweet, and sunny thyme; Yea, every flower and leaf of every clime,

       All gather’d in the dewy morning: hie

       Away! fly, fly!–

       Crystalline brother of the belt of heaven,

       Aquarius! to whom king Jove has given

       Two liquid pulse streams ‘stead of feather’d wings,

       Two fan-like fountains,–thine illuminings

       For Dian play:

       Dissolve the frozen purity of air;

       Let thy white shoulders silvery and bare Shew cold through watery pinions; make more bright

       The Star-Queen’s crescent on her marriage night:

       Haste, haste away!–

       Castor has tamed the planet Lion, see!

       And of the Bear has Pollux mastery:

       A third is in the race! who is the third,

       Speeding away swift as the eagle bird?

       The ramping Centaur!

       The Lion’s mane’s on end: the Bear how fierce!

       The Centaur’s arrow ready seems to pierce Some enemy: far forth his bow is bent

       Into the blue of heaven. He’ll be shent,

       Pale unrelentor,

       When he shall hear the wedding lutes a playing.–

       Andromeda! sweet woman! why delaying

       So timidly among the stars: come hither!

       Join this bright throng, and nimbly follow whither

       They all are going.

       Danae’s Son, before Jove newly bow’d,

       Has wept for thee, calling to Jove aloud. Thee, gentle lady, did he disenthral:

       Ye shall for ever live and love, for all

       Thy tears are flowing.–

      By Daphne’s fright, behold Apollo!–”

      More

      Endymion heard not: down his steed him bore,

       Prone to the green head of a misty hill.

      His first touch of the earth went nigh to kill.

       “Alas!” said he, “were I but always borne

       Through dangerous winds, had but my footsteps worn

       A path in hell, for ever would I bless Horrors which nourish an uneasiness

       For my own sullen conquering: to him

       Who lives beyond earth’s boundary, grief is dim,

       Sorrow is but a shadow: now I see

       The grass; I feel the solid ground–Ah, me!

       It is thy voice–divinest! Where?–who? who

       Left thee so quiet on this bed of dew?

       Behold upon this happy earth we are;

       Let us ay love each other; let us fare On forest-fruits, and never, never go

       Among the abodes of mortals here below,

       Or be by phantoms duped. O destiny!

       Into a labyrinth now my soul would fly,

       But with thy beauty will I deaden it.

       Where didst thou melt too? By thee will I sit

       For ever: let our fate stop here–a kid

       I on this spot will offer: Pan will bid

       Us live in peace, in love and peace among

       His forest wildernesses. I have clung To nothing, lov’d a nothing, nothing seen

       Or felt but a great dream! O I have been

       Presumptuous against love, against the sky,

       Against all elements, against the tie

       Of mortals each to each, against the blooms

       Of flowers, rush of rivers, and the tombs

       Of heroes gone! Against his proper glory

       Has my own soul conspired: so my story

       Will I to children utter, and repent.

       There never liv’d a mortal man, who bent His appetite beyond his natural sphere,

       But starv’d and died. My sweetest Indian, here,

       Here will I kneel, for thou redeemed hast

       My life from too thin breathing: gone and past

       Are cloudy phantasms. Caverns lone, farewel!

       And air of visions, and the monstrous swell

       Of visionary seas! No, never more

       Shall airy voices cheat me to the shore

       Of tangled wonder, breathless and aghast.

       Adieu, my daintiest Dream! although so vast My love is still for thee. The hour may come

       When we shall meet in pure elysium.

       On earth I may not love thee; and therefore

       Doves will I offer

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