FROM PROMETHEUS UNBOUND.'

Semichorus I. of Spirits (as Asia and Panthea pass into the forest).

The path through which that lovely twain
Have passed, by cedar, pine, and yew,
And each dark tree that ever grew,

Is curtained out from heaven's wide blue.
Nor sun nor moon nor wind nor rain
Can pierce its interwoven bowers ;

Nor aught save where some cloud of dew,
Drifted along the earth-creeping breeze
Between the trunks of the hoar trees,
Hangs each a pearl in the pale flowers
Of the green laurel blown anew,
And bends, and then fades silently,
One frail and fair anemone.

Or, when some star, of many a one

That climbs and wanders through steep night,

Has found the cleft through which alone

Beams fall from high those depths upon,—
Ere it is borne away, away,

By the swift heavens that cannot stay,-
It scatters drops of golden light,
Like lines of rain that ne'er unite:

And the gloom divine is all around,
And underneath is the mossy ground.

Semichorus II.

There the voluptuous nightingales

Are awake through all the broad noonday.

When one with bliss or sadness fails,

And through the windless ivy-boughs,

Sick with sweet love, droops dying away
On its mate's music-panting bosom ;
Another, from the swinging blossom

Watching to catch the languid close
Of the last strain, then lifts on high
The wings of the weak melody,—
Till some new strain of feeling bear

The song, and all the woods are mute;
When there is heard through the dim air
The rush of wings, and, rising there

Like many a lake-surrounded flute, Sounds overflow the listener's brain So sweet that joy is almost pain.

[From the same.]

VOICE in the air, singing.

Life of Life! thy lips enkindle

With their love the breath between them;
And thy smiles, before they dwindle,

Make the cold air fire,-then screen them
In those looks where whoso gazes
Faints, entangled in their mazes.

Child of Light! thy limbs are burning

Through the vest which seems to hide them, As the radiant lines of morning

Through the clouds, ere they divide them;

And this atmosphere divinest

Shrouds thee wheresoe'er thou shinest.

Fair are others; none beholds thee

(But thy voice sounds low and tender,

Like the fairest), for it folds thee

From the sight-that liquid splendour;
And all feel, yet see thee never,
As I feel now, lost for ever!

Lamp of Earth! where'er thou movest,
Its dim shapes are clad with brightness,

And the souls of whom thou lovest
Walk upon the winds with lightness,
Till they fail, as I am failing,

Dizzy, lost, yet unbewailing!

(1820.)

HYMN OF PAN.

From the forests and highlands
We come, we come;
From the river-girt islands,

Where loud waves are dumb

Listening to my sweet pipings.

The wind in the reeds and the rushes,
The bees on the bells of thyme,
The birds on the myrtle-bushes,
The cicale above in the lime,
And the lizards below in the grass,
Were as silent as ever old Tmolus was,
Listening to my sweet pipings.

Liquid Peneus was flowing,
And all dark Tempe lay
In Pelion's shadow, outgrowing
The light of the dying day,
Speeded by my sweet pipings.

The Sileni and Sylvans and Fauns,

And the Nymphs of the woods and waves,
To the edge of the moist river-lawns,
And the brink of the dewy caves,

And all that did then attend and follow,
Were silent with love,-as you now, Apollo,
With envy of my sweet pipings.

I sang of the dancing stars,

I sang of the dædal earth,

And of heaven, and the Giant wars,
And love, and death, and birth.
And then I changed my pipings,-
Singing how down the vale of Mænalus

I pursued a maiden, and clasped a reed:
Gods and men, we are all deluded thus;

It breaks in our bosom, and then we bleed.
All wept as I think both ye now would,
If envy or age had not frozen your blood-
At the sorrow of my sweet pipings.

(1820.)

THE CLOUD.

I.

I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers
From the seas and the streams;

I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams.

From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet buds every one,

When rocked to rest on their Mother's breast, As she dances about the sun.

I wield the flail of the lashing hail,

And whiten the green plains under; And then again I dissolve it in rain, And laugh as I pass in thunder.

II.

I sift the snow on the mountains below,
And their great pines groan aghast;
And all the night 'tis my pillow white,

While I sleep in the arms of the Blast.
Sublime on the towers of my skiey bowers
Lightning my pilot sits;

In a cavern under is fettered the Thunder,
It struggles and howls at fits.

Over earth and ocean with gentle motion
This pilot is guiding me,

Lured by the love of the Genii that move
In the depths of the purple sea;

Over the rills and the crags and the hills,
Over the lakes and the plains,

Wherever he dream under mountain or stream
The Spirit he loves remains ;

And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, Whilst he is dissolving in rains.

III.

The sanguine Sunrise, with his meteor eyes,
And his burning plumes outspread,
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack,

When the morning star shines dead:

As on the jag of a mountain-crag

Which an earthquake rocks and swings

An eagle alit one moment may sit

In the light of its golden wings.

And, when Sunset may breathe, from the lit sea beneath, Its ardour of rest and of love,

And the crimson pall of eve may fall

From the depth of heaven above,

With wings folded I rest on mine airy nest,

As still as a brooding dove.

IV.

That orbed maiden with white fire laden
Whom mortals call the Moon

Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor
By the midnight breezes strewn ;

And wherever the beat of her unseen feet,
Which only the angels hear,

May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof,
The Stars peep behind her and peer.

And I laugh to see them whirl and flee

Like a swarm of golden bees,

When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent,—
Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas,

Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high,
Are each paved with the moon and these.

V.

I bind the Sun's throne with a burning zone,
And the Moon's with a girdle of pearl;

The volcanoes are dim, and the Stars reel and swim,
When the Whirlwinds my banner unfurl.