For Winter came: the wind was his whip: 90 He had torn the cataracts from the hills His breath was a chain which without a sound Then the weeds which were forms of living death Their decay and sudden flight from frost And under the roots of the Sensitive Plant 95 100 And were caught in the branches naked and bare. 105 First there came down a thawing rain And its dull drops froze on the boughs again; And a northern whirlwind, wandering about ΓΙΟ When winter had gone and spring came back 115 But the mandrakes, and toadstools, and docks, and darnels, Rose like the dead from their ruined charnels. CONCLUSION. Whether the Sensitive Plant, or that Whether that Lady's gentle mind, I dare not guess; but in this life Of error, ignorance, and strife, Where nothing is, but all things seem, It is a modest creed, and yet Pleasant if one considers it, To own that death itself must be, That garden sweet, that Lady fair, 'Tis we, 'tis ours, are changed; not they. For love, and beauty, and delight, There is no death nor change: their might No light, being themselves obscure. 1820. THE CLOUD. I BRING fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, I bear light shade for the leaves when laid In their noon-day dreams. From my wings are shaken the dews that waken When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, I wield the flail of the lashing hail, And whiten the green plains under, I sift the snow on the mountains below, And their great pines groan aghast; And all the night 't is my pillow white, While I sleep in the arms of the blast. In a cavern under is fettered the thunder, Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion, 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, 5 ΙΟ 15 20 25 30 The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes, Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, When the morning star shines dead, As on the jag of a mountain crag, 35 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 ardours 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, That orbed maiden with white fire laden, Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor, 40 45 And wherever the beat of her unseen feet, Which only the angels hear, 50 May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof, 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, Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high, Are each paved with the moon and these. I bind the sun's throne with a burning zone, The volcanoes are dim, and the stars reel and swim, 55 60 From cape to cape, with a bridge-like shape, Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof, The mountains its columns be. The triumphal arch through which I march With hurricane, fire, and snow, When the powers of the air are chained to my chair, Is the million-coloured bow; The sphere-fire above its soft colours wove, While the moist earth was laughing below. I am the daughter of earth and water, I And the nursling of the sky; pass through the pores of the ocean and shores; I change, but I cannot die. For after the rain when, with never a stain, The pavilion of heaven is bare, And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams Build up the blue dome of air, I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, And out of the caverns of rain, Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise and unbuild it again. TO A SKYLARK. HAIL to thee, blithe spirit! Bird thou never wert, That from heaven, or near it, 1820. 65 70 75 80 Pourest thy full heart In profuse strains of unpremeditated art. 5 |