| |
| JUST at the self-same beat of Time’s wide wings | |
| Hyperion slid into the rustled air, | |
| And Saturn gain’d with Thea that sad place | |
| Where Cybele and the bruised Titans mourn’d. | |
| It was a den where no insulting light | 5 |
| Could glimmer on their tears; where their own groans | |
| They felt, but heard not, for the solid roar | |
| Of thunderous waterfalls and torrents hoarse, | |
| Pouring a constant bulk, uncertain where. | |
| Crag jutting forth to crag, and rocks that seem’d | 10 |
| Ever as if just rising from a sleep, | |
| Forehead to forehead held their monstrous horns; | |
| And thus in thousand hugest phantasies | |
| Made a fit roofing to this nest of woe. | |
| Instead of thrones, hard flint they sat upon, | 15 |
| Couches of rugged stone, and slaty ridge | |
| Stubborn’d with iron. All were not assembled: | |
| Some chain’d in torture, and some wandering. | |
| Coeus, and Gyges, and Briareüs, | |
| Typhon, and Dolor, and Porphyrion, | 20 |
| With many more, the brawniest in assault, | |
| Were pent in regions of laborious breath; | |
| Dungeon’d in opaque element, to keep | |
| Their clenched teeth still clench’d, and all their limbs | |
| Lock’d up like veins of metal, crampt and screw’d; | 25 |
| Without a motion, save of their big hearts | |
| Heaving in pain, and horribly convuls’d | |
| With sanguine feverous boiling gurge of pulse. | |
| Mnemosyne was straying in the world; | |
| Far from her moon had Phoebe wandered; | 30 |
| And many else were free to roam abroad, | |
| But for the main, here found they covert drear. | |
| Scarce images of life, one here, one there, | |
| Lay vast and edgeways; like a dismal cirque | |
| Of Druid stones, upon a forlorn moor, | 35 |
| When the chill rain begins at shut of eve, | |
| In dull November, and their chancel vault, | |
| The Heaven itself, is blinded throughout night. | |
| Each one kept shroud, nor to his neighbour gave | |
| Or word, or look, or action of despair. | 40 |
| Creus was one; his ponderous iron mace | |
| Lay by him, and a shatter’d rib of rock | |
| Told of his rage, ere he thus sank and pined. | |
| Iapetus another; in his grasp, | |
| A serpent’s plashy neck; its barbed tongue | 45 |
| Squeez’d from the gorge, and all its uncurl’d length | |
| Dead; and because the creature could not spit | |
| Its poison in the eyes of conquering Jove. | |
| Next Cottus: prone he lay, chin uppermost, | |
| As though in pain; for still upon the flint | 50 |
| He ground severe his skull, with open mouth | |
| And eyes at horrid working. Nearest him | |
| Asia, born of most enormous Caf, | |
| Who cost her mother Tellus keener pangs, | |
| Though feminine, than any of her sons: | 55 |
| More thought than woe was in her dusky face, | |
| For she was prophesying of her glory; | |
| And in her wide imagination stood | |
| Palm-shaded temples, and high rival fanes, | |
| By Oxus or in Ganges’ sacred isles. | 60 |
| Even as Hope upon her anchor leans, | |
| So leant she, not so fair, upon a tusk | |
| Shed from the broadest of her elephants. | |
| Above her, on a crag’s uneasy shelve, | |
| Upon his elbow rais’d, all prostrate else, | 65 |
| Shadow’d Enceladus; once tame and mild | |
| As grazing ox unworried in the meads; | |
| Now tiger-passion’d, lion-thoughted, wroth, | |
| He meditated, plotted, and even now | |
| Was hurling mountains in that second war, | 70 |
| Not long delay’d, that scar’d the younger Gods | |
| To hide themselves in forms of beast and bird. | |
| Nor far hence Atlas; and beside him prone | |
| Phorcus, the sire of Gorgons. Neighbour’d close | |
| Oceanus, and Tethys, in whose lap | 75 |
| Sobb’d Clymene among her tangled hair. | |
| In midst of all lay Themis, at the feet | |
| Of Ops the queen all clouded round from sight; | |
| No shape distinguishable, more than when | |
| Thick night confounds the pine-tops with the clouds: | 80 |
| And many else whose names may not be told. | |
| For when the Muse’s wings are air-ward spread, | |
| Who shall delay her flight? And she must chaunt | |
| Of Saturn, and his guide, who now had climb’d | |
| With damp and slippery footing from a depth | 85 |
| More horrid still. Above a sombre cliff | |
| Their heads appear’d, and up their stature grew | |
| Till on the level height their steps found ease: | |
| Then Thea spread abroad her trembling arms | |
| Upon the precincts of this nest of pain, | 90 |
| And sidelong fix’d her eye on Saturn’s face: | |
| There saw she direst strife; the supreme God | |
| At war with all the frailty of grief, | |
| Of rage, of fear, anxiety, revenge, | |
| Remorse, spleen, hope, but most of all despair. | 95 |
| Against these plagues he strove in vain; for Fate | |
| Had pour’d a mortal oil upon his head, | |
| A disanointing poison: so that Thea, | |
| Affrighted, kept her still, and let him pass | |
| First onwards in, among the fallen tribe. | 100 |
| |
| As with us mortal men, the laden heart | |
| Is persecuted more, and fever’d more, | |
| When it is nighing to the mournful house | |
| Where other hearts are sick of the same bruise; | |
| So Saturn, as he walk’d into the midst, | 105 |
| Felt faint, and would have sunk among the rest, | |
| But that he met Enceladus’s eye, | |
| Whose mightiness, and awe of him, at once | |
| Came like an inspiration; and he shouted, | |
| “Titans, behold your God!” at which some groan’d; | 110 |
| Some started on their feet; some also shouted; | |
| Some wept, some wail’d, all bow’d with reverence; | |
| And Ops, uplifting her black folded veil, | |
| Show’d her pale cheeks, and all her forehead wan, | |
| Her eye-brows thin and jet, and hollow eyes. | 115 |
| There is a roaring in the bleak-grown pines | |
| When Winter lifts his voice; there is a noise | |
| Among immortals when a God gives sign, | |
| With hushing finger, how he means to load | |
| His tongue with the full weight of utterless thought, | 120 |
| With thunder, and with music, and with pomp: | |
| Such noise is like the roar of bleak-grown pines; | |
| Which, when it ceases in this mountain’d world, | |
| No other sound succeeds; but ceasing here, | |
| Among these fallen, Saturn’s voice therefrom | 125 |
| Grew up like organ, that begins anew | |
| Its strain, when other harmonies, stopt short, | |
| Leave the dinn’d air vibrating silverly. | |
| Thus grew it up—“Not in my own sad breast, | |
| “Which is its own great judge and searcher out, | 130 |
| “Can I find reason why ye should be thus: | |
| “Not in the legends of the first of days, | |
| “Studied from that old spirit-leaved book | |
| “Which starry Uranus with finger bright | |
| “Sav’d from the shores of darkness, when the waves | 135 |
| “Low-ebb’d still hid it up in shallow gloom;— | |
| “And the which book ye know I ever kept | |
| “For my firm-based footstool:—Ah, infirm! | |
| “Not there, nor in sign, symbol, or portent | |
| “Of element, earth, water, air, and fire,— | 140 |
| “At war, at peace, or inter-quarreling | |
| “One against one, or two, or three, or all | |
| “Each several one against the other three, | |
| “As fire with air loud warring when rain-floods | |
| “Drown both, and press them both against earth’s face, | 145 |
| “Where, finding sulphur, a quadruple wrath | |
| “Unhinges the poor world;—not in that strife, | |
| “Wherefrom I take strange lore, and read it deep, | |
| “Can I find reason why ye should be thus: | |
| “No, no-where can unriddle, though I search, | 150 |
| “And pore on Nature’s universal scroll | |
| “Even to swooning, why ye, Divinities, | |
| “The first-born of all shap’d and palpable Gods, | |
| “Should cower beneath what, in comparison, | |
| “Is untremendous might. Yet ye are here, | 155 |
| “O’erwhelm’d, and spurn’d, and batter’d, ye are here! | |
| “O Titans, shall I say ‘Arise!’—Ye groan: | |
| “Shall I say ‘Crouch!’—Ye groan. What can I then? | |
| “O Heaven wide! O unseen parent dear! | |
| “What can I? Tell me, all ye brethren Gods, | 160 |
| “How we can war, how engine our great wrath! | |
| “O speak your counsel now, for Saturn’s ear | |
| “Is all a-hunger’d. Thou, Oceanus, | |
| “Ponderest high and deep; and in thy face | |
| “I see, astonied, that severe content | 165 |
| “Which comes of thought and musing: give us help!” | |
| |
| So ended Saturn; and the God of the Sea, | |
| Sophist and sage, from no Athenian grove, | |
| But cogitation in his watery shades, | |
| Arose, with locks not oozy, and began, | 170 |
| In murmurs, which his first-endeavouring tongue | |
| Caught infant-like from the far-foamed sands. | |
| “O ye, whom wrath consumes! who, passion-stung, | |
| “Writhe at defeat, and nurse your agonies! | |
| “Shut up your senses, stifle up your ears, | 175 |
| “My voice is not a bellows unto ire. | |
| “Yet listen, ye who will, whilst I bring proof | |
| “How ye, perforce, must be content to stoop: | |
| “And in the proof much comfort will I give, | |
| “If ye will take that comfort in its truth. | 180 |
| “We fall by course of Nature’s law, not force | |
| “Of thunder, or of Jove. Great Saturn, thou | |
| “Hast sifted well the atom-universe; | |
| “But for this reason, that thou art the King, | |
| “And only blind from sheer supremacy, | 185 |
| “One avenue was shaded from thine eyes, | |
| “Through which I wandered to eternal truth. | |
| “And first, as thou wast not the first of powers, | |
| “So art thou not the last; it cannot be: | |
| “Thou art not the beginning nor the end. | 190 |
| “From chaos and parental darkness came | |
| “Light, the first fruits of that intestine broil, | |
| “That sullen ferment, which for wondrous ends | |
| “Was ripening in itself. The ripe hour came, | |
| “And with it light, and light, engendering | 195 |
| “Upon its own producer, forthwith touch’d | |
| “The whole enormous matter into life. | |
| “Upon that very hour, our parentage, | |
| “The Heavens and the Earth, were manifest: | |
| “Then thou first-born, and we the giant-race, | 200 |
| “Found ourselves ruling new and beauteous realms. | |
| “Now comes the pain of truth, to whom ’tis pain; | |
| “O folly! for to bear all naked truths, | |
| “And to envisage circumstance, all calm, | |
| “That is the top of sovereignty. Mark well! | 205 |
| “As Heaven and Earth are fairer, fairer far | |
| “Than Chaos and blank Darkness, though once chiefs; | |
| “And as we show beyond that Heaven and Earth | |
| “In form and shape compact and beautiful, | |
| “In will, in action free, companionship, | 210 |
| “And thousand other signs of purer life; | |
| “So on our heels a fresh perfection treads, | |
| “A power more strong in beauty, born of us | |
| “And fated to excel us, as we pass | |
| “In glory that old Darkness: nor are we | 215 |
| “Thereby more conquer’d, than by us the rule | |
| “Of shapeless Chaos. Say, doth the dull soil | |
| “Quarrel with the proud forests it hath fed, | |
| “And feedeth still, more comely than itself? | |
| “Can it deny the chiefdom of green groves? | 220 |
| “Or shall the tree be envious of the dove | |
| “Because it cooeth, and hath snowy wings | |
| “To wander wherewithal and find its joys? | |
| “We are such forest-trees, and our fair boughs | |
| “Have bred forth, not pale solitary doves, | 225 |
| “But eagles golden-feather’d, who do tower | |
| “Above us in their beauty, and must reign | |
| “In right thereof; for ’tis the eternal law | |
| “That first in beauty should be first in might: | |
| “Yea, by that law, another race may drive | 230 |
| “Our conquerors to mourn as we do now. | |
| “Have ye beheld the young God of the Seas, | |
| “My dispossessor? Have ye seen his face? | |
| “Have ye beheld his chariot, foam’d along | |
| “By noble winged creatures he hath made? | 235 |
| “I saw him on the calmed waters scud, | |
| “With such a glow of beauty in his eyes, | |
| “That it enforc’d me to bid sad farewell | |
| “To all my empire: farewell sad I took, | |
| “And hither came, to see how dolorous fate | 240 |
| “Had wrought upon ye; and how I might best | |
| “Give consolation in this woe extreme. | |
| “Receive the truth, and let it be your balm.” | |
| |
| Whether through poz’d conviction, or disdain, | |
| They guarded silence, when Oceanus | 245 |
| Left murmuring, what deepest thought can tell? | |
| But so it was, none answer’d for a space, | |
| Save one whom none regarded, Clymene; | |
| And yet she answer’d not, only complain’d, | |
| With hectic lips, and eyes up-looking mild, | 250 |
| Thus wording timidly among the fierce: | |
| “O Father, I am here the simplest voice, | |
| “And all my knowledge is that joy is gone, | |
| “And this thing woe crept in among our hearts, | |
| “There to remain for ever, as I fear: | 255 |
| “I would not bode of evil, if I thought | |
| “So weak a creature could turn off the help | |
| “Which by just right should come of mighty Gods; | |
| “Yet let me tell my sorrow, let me tell | |
| “Of what I heard, and how it made me weep, | 260 |
| “And know that we had parted from all hope. | |
| “I stood upon a shore, a pleasant shore, | |
| “Where a sweet clime was breathed from a land | |
| “Of fragrance, quietness, and trees, and flowers. | |
| “Full of calm joy it was, as I of grief; | 265 |
| “Too full of joy and soft delicious warmth; | |
| “So that I felt a movement in my heart | |
| “To chide, and to reproach that solitude | |
| “With songs of misery, music of our woes; | |
| “And sat me down, and took a mouthed shell | 270 |
| “And murmur’d into it, and made melody— | |
| “O melody no more! for while I sang, | |
| “And with poor skill let pass into the breeze | |
| “The dull shell’s echo, from a bowery strand | |
| “Just opposite, an island of the sea, | 275 |
| “There came enchantment with the shifting wind, | |
| “That did both drown and keep alive my ears. | |
| “I threw my shell away upon the sand, | |
| “And a wave fill’d it, as my sense was fill’d | |
| “With that new blissful golden melody. | 280 |
| “A living death was in each gush of sounds, | |
| “Each family of rapturous hurried notes, | |
| “That fell, one after one, yet all at once, | |
| “Like pearl beads dropping sudden from their string: | |
| “And then another, then another strain, | 285 |
| “Each like a dove leaving its olive perch, | |
| “With music wing’d instead of silent plumes, | |
| “To hover round my head, and make me sick | |
| “Of joy and grief at once. Grief overcame, | |
| “And I was stopping up my frantic ears, | 290 |
| “When, past all hindrance of my trembling hands, | |
| “A voice came sweeter, sweeter than all tune, | |
| “And still it cried, ‘Apollo! young Apollo! | |
| “‘The morning-bright Apollo! young Apollo!’ | |
| “I fled, it follow’d me, and cried ‘Apollo!’ | 295 |
| “O Father, and O Brethren, had ye felt | |
| “Those pains of mine; O Saturn, hadst thou felt, | |
| “Ye would not call this too indulged tongue | |
| “Presumptuous, in thus venturing to be heard.” | |
| |
| So far her voice flow’d on, like timorous brook | 300 |
| That, lingering along a pebbled coast, | |
| Doth fear to meet the sea: but sea it met, | |
| And shudder’d; for the overwhelming voice | |
| Of huge Enceladus swallow’d it in wrath: | |
| The ponderous syllables, like sullen waves | 305 |
| In the half-glutted hollows of reef-rocks, | |
| Came booming thus, while still upon his arm | |
| He lean’d; not rising, from supreme contempt. | |
| “Or shall we listen to the over-wise, | |
| “Or to the over-foolish giant, Gods? | 310 |
| “Not thunderbolt on thunderbolt, till all | |
| “That rebel Jove’s whole armoury were spent, | |
| “Not world on world upon these shoulders piled, | |
| “Could agonize me more than baby-words | |
| “In midst of this dethronement horrible. | 315 |
| “Speak! roar! shout! yell! ye sleepy Titans all. | |
| “Do ye forget the blows, the buffets vile? | |
| “Are ye not smitten by a youngling arm? | |
| “Dost thou forget, sham Monarch of the Waves, | |
| “Thy scalding in the seas? What, have I rous’d | 320 |
| “Your spleens with so few simple words as these? | |
| “O joy! for now I see ye are not lost: | |
| “O joy! for now I see a thousand eyes | |
| “Wide glaring for revenge!”—As this he said, | |
| He lifted up his stature vast, and stood, | 325 |
| Still without intermission speaking thus: | |
| “Now ye are flames, I’ll tell you how to burn, | |
| “And purge the ether of our enemies; | |
| “How to feed fierce the crooked stings of fire, | |
| “And singe away the swollen clouds of Jove, | 330 |
| “Stifling that puny essence in its tent. | |
| “O let him feel the evil he hath done; | |
| “For though I scorn Oceanus’s lore, | |
| “Much pain have I for more than loss of realms: | |
| “The days of peace and slumberous calm are fled; | 335 |
| “Those days, all innocent of scathing war, | |
| “When all the fair Existences of heaven | |
| “Came open-eyed to guess what we would speak:— | |
| “That was before our brows were taught to frown, | |
| “Before our lips knew else but solemn sounds; | 340 |
| “That was before we knew the winged thing, | |
| “Victory, might be lost, or might be won. | |
| “And be ye mindful that Hyperion, | |
| “Our brightest brother, still is undisgraced— | |
| “Hyperion, lo! his radiance is here!” | 345 |
| |
| All eyes were on Enceladus’s face, | |
| And they beheld, while still Hyperion’s name | |
| Flew from his lips up to the vaulted rocks, | |
| A pallid gleam across his features stern: | |
| Not savage, for he saw full many a God | 350 |
| Wroth as himself. He look’d upon them all, | |
| And in each face he saw a gleam of light, | |
| But splendider in Saturn’s, whose hoar locks | |
| Shone like the bubbling foam about a keel | |
| When the prow sweeps into a midnight cove. | 355 |
| In pale and silver silence they remain’d, | |
| Till suddenly a splendour, like the morn, | |
| Pervaded all the beetling gloomy steeps, | |
| All the sad spaces of oblivion, | |
| And every gulf, and every chasm old, | 360 |
| And every height, and every sullen depth, | |
| Voiceless, or hoarse with loud tormented streams: | |
| And all the everlasting cataracts, | |
| And all the headlong torrents far and near, | |
| Mantled before in darkness and huge shade, | 365 |
| Now saw the light and made it terrible. | |
| It was Hyperion:—a granite peak | |
| His bright feet touch’d, and there he stay’d to view | |
| The misery his brilliance had betray’d | |
| To the most hateful seeing of itself. | 370 |
| Golden his hair of short Numidian curl, | |
| Regal his shape majestic, a vast shade | |
| In midst of his own brightness, like the bulk | |
| Of Memnon’s image at the set of sun | |
| To one who travels from the dusking East: | 375 |
| Sighs, too, as mournful as that Memnon’s harp | |
| He utter’d, while his hands contemplative | |
| He press’d together, and in silence stood. | |
| Despondence seiz’d again the fallen Gods | |
| At sight of the dejected King of Day, | 380 |
| And many hid their faces from the light: | |
| But fierce Enceladus sent forth his eyes | |
| Among the brotherhood; and, at their glare, | |
| Uprose Iapetus, and Creus too, | |
| And Phorcus, sea-born, and together strode | 385 |
| To where he towered on his eminence. | |
| There those four shouted forth old Saturn’s name; | |
| Hyperion from the peak loud answered, “Saturn! | |
| Saturn sat near the Mother of the Gods, | |
| In whose face was no joy, though all the Gods | 390 |
| Gave from their hollow throats the name of “Saturn!” | |
| |
| See Notes. |
| |
