| Andrew Macphail, comp. The Book of Sorrow. 1916. | | | XXII. Irrevocable
From ‘Epipsychidion’ | | By Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) |
| | | SHE, whom prayers or tears then could not tame, | |
| Passed, like a God throned on a wingèd planet; | |
| Whose burning plumes to tenfold swiftness fan it; | |
| Into the dreary cone of our life’s shade; | |
| And as a man with mighty loss dismayed, | 5 |
| I would have followed, though the grave between | |
| Yawned like a gulf whose spectres are unseen: | |
| When a voice said:—‘O thou of hearts the weakest, | |
| The phantom is beside thee whom thou seekest.’ | |
| Then I—‘Where?’—the world’s echo answered ‘where?’ | 10 |
| And in that silence, and in my despair, | |
| I questioned every tongueless wind that flew | |
| Over my tower of mourning, if it knew | |
| Whither ’twas fled, this soul out of my soul; | |
| And murmured names and spells which have control | 15 |
| Over the sightless tyrants of our fate; | |
| But neither prayer nor verse could dissipate | |
| The night which closed on her … | | | | |
|
|
