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"With loveliness — more fair than aught but her,
"Whose shadow thou art - lift thine eyes on me."
I lifted them: the overpowering light
Of that immortal shape was shadowed o'er
By love; which, from his soft and flowing limbs,
And passion-parted lips, and keen, faint eyes,
Steamed forth like vaporous fire; an atmosphere
Which wrapped me in its all-dissolving power,
As the warm æther of the morning sun
Wraps ere it drinks some cloud of wandering dew.
I saw not, heard not, moved not, only felt
His presence flow and mingle through my blood
Till it became his life, and his grew mine,
And I was thus absorbed, until it passed,
And like the vapours when the sun sinks down,
Gathering again in drops upon the pines,
And tremulous as they, in the deep night
My being was condensed; and as the rays
Of thought were slowly gathered, I could hear
His voice, whose accents lingered ere they died
Like footsteps of weak melody: thy name
Among the many sounds alone I heard

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Of what might be articulate; though still

I listened through the night when sound was none.
Ione wakened then, and said to me:

"Canst thou divine what troubles me to-night?

"I always knew what I desired before,

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"Nor ever found delight to wish in vain. "But now I cannot tell thee what I seek;

"I know not; something sweet, since it is sweet
"Even to desire; it is thy sport, false sister;
"Thou hast discovered some enchantment old,
"Whose spells have stolen my spirit as I slept

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"And mingled it with thine: for when just now

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"We kissed, I felt within thy parted lips

"The sweet air that sustained me, and the warmth
"Of the life-blood, for loss of which I faint,
"Quivered between our intertwining arms."
I answered not, for the Eastern star grew pale,
But fled to thee.

ASIA.

Thou speakest, but thy words

Are as the air: I feel them not: Oh, lift
Thine eyes, that I may read his written soul!

PANTHEA.

I lift them though they droop beneath the load
Of that they would express: what canst thou see
But thine own fairest shadow imaged there?

ASIA.

Thine eyes are like the deep, blue, boundless heaven
Contracted to two circles underneath

Their long, fine lashes; dark, far, measureless,
Orb within orb, and line through line inwoven.

PANTHEA.

Why lookest thou as if a spirit passed?

ASIA.

There is a change: beyond their inmost depth
I see a shade, a shape: 't is He, arrayed
In the soft light of his own smiles, which spread
Like radiance from the cloud-surrounded moon.
Prometheus, it is thine! depart not yet!
Say not those smiles that we shall meet again
Within that bright pavilion which their beams

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Shall build on the waste world?

The dream is told.

What shape is that between us? Its rude hair
Roughens the wind that lifts it, its regard

Is wild and quick, yet 't is a thing of air

For through its gray robe gleams the golden dew
Whose stars the noon has quenched not.

DREAM.

Follow! Follow!

PANTHEA.

It is mine other dream.

ASIA.

It disappears.

PANTHEA.

It passes now into my mind. Methought
As we sate here, the flower-infolding buds
Burst on yon lightning-blasted almond-tree,
When swift from the white Scythian wilderness

A wind swept forth wrinkling the Earth with frost:
I looked, and all the blossoms were blown down;
But on each leaf was stamped, as the blue bells
Of Hyacinth tell Apollo's written grief,

O, FOLLOW, FOLLOW!

ASIA.

As you speak, your words

Fill, pause by pause, my own forgotten sleep

With shapes. Methought among the lawns together
We wandered, underneath the young gray dawn,
And multitudes of dense white fleecy clouds
Were wandering in thick flocks along the mountains
Shepherded by the slow, unwilling wind;

And the white dew on the new bladed grass,

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Just piercing the dark earth, hung silently:
And there was more which I remember not:
But on the shadows of the morning clouds,
Athwart the purple mountain slope, was written
FOLLOW, O, FOLLOW! as they vanished by,

And on each herb, from which Heaven's dew had
fallen,

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The like was stamped, as with a withering fire.

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A wind arose among the pines; it shook

The clinging music from their boughs, and then

Low, sweet, faint sounds, like the farewell of ghosts,
Were heard: OH, FOLLOW, FOLLOW, FOLLOW ME!

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And then I said: " Panthea, look on me."

But in the depth of those beloved eyes

Still I saw, FOLLOW, FOLLOW!

Есно.

Follow, follow!

PANTHEA.

The crags, this clear spring morning, mock our voices
As they were spirit-tongued.

ASIA.

It is some being

Around the crags. What fine clear sounds! O, list!

ECHOES (unseen).

Echoes we: listen!

We cannot stay:

As dew-stars glisten

Then fade away

Child of Ocean!

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ASIA.

Hark! Spirits speak. The liquid responses

Of their aërial tongues yet sound.

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