1818. Into her mother's bosom sweet and soft,Nature's pure tears which have no bitterness. Around the cradles of the birds aloft 1818. 1818. 1818. They spread themselves into the loveliness Of fan-like leaves; and over pallid flowers Hang like moist clouds; or, where high branches kiss, Make a green space among the silent bowers (Like a vast fane in a metropolis, Surrounded by the columns and the towers All overwrought with branch-like traceries); In which there is religion, and the mute Persuasion of unkindied melodies, Odours, and gleams, and murmurs, which the lute Of the blind Pilot-Spirit of the blast Stirs as it sails, now grave and now acute,— The world is full of Woodmen who expel VI. O MIGHTY mind, in whose deep stream this age VII. SILENCE! Oh well are Death and Sleep and Thou Are swallowed up. Yet spare me, Spirit, pity me! VIII. THE fierce beasts of the woods and wildernesses 552 IX. My head is wild with weeping for a grief To seek,-or haply, if I sought, to find; 1818. X. Flourishing vine, whose kindling clusters glow Mad. No access to the Duke! You have not said Mal. The Lady Leonora cannot know In which I . . . Venus and Adonis. You should not take my gold, and serve me not. Art the Adonis whom I love, and he The Erymanthian boar that wounded him." Oh trust to me, Signor Malpiglio, Those nods and smiles were favours worth the zechin, That I reach not: the smiles fell not on me. Pigna. How are the Duke and Duchess occupied ? Alb. Buried in some strange talk. The Duke was leaning— His finger on his brow, his lips unclosed. The Princess sate within the window-seat, And so her face was hid; but on her knee Her hands were clasped, veinèd, and pale as snow, And quivering. Young Tasso, too, was there. Mad. Thou seest on whom from thine own worshiped heaven 1818. SONG FOR TASSO. I LOVED-alas! our life is love; But, when we cease to breathe and move, I thought (but not as now I do) Keen thoughts and bright of linkèd lore,- And still I love, and still I think, And, if I think, my thoughts come fast Sometimes I see before me flee A silver spirit's form, like thee, still watching it, ; Till by the grated casement's ledge XII. I. LET those who pine in pride or in revenge, 2. A massy tower yet overhangs the town, 3. Another scene ere wise Etruria knew Its second ruin through internal strife, As death to life, As winter to fair flowers (though some be poison) 4. In Pisa's church a cup of sculptured gold Was brimming with the blood of feuds forsworn 5. And reconciling factions wet their lips With that dread wine, and swear to keep each spirit Undarkened by their country's last eclipse. 6. Was Florence the liberticide? that band Of free and glorious brothers who had planted, A nation amid slaveries, disenchanted Since Athens, its great mother, sunk in splendour, As ocean its wrecked fanes, severe yet tender. Was drawn from the dim world to welcome thee. 8. And thou in painting didst transcribe all taught By loftiest meditations; marble knew The sculptor's fearless soul, and, as he wrought, Of direst weeds hangs garlanded-the snake A beast of subtler venom now doth make And love and freedom blossom but to wither; But, if the morning bright as evening shone, Pursued into forgetfulness, which won A penalty of blood on all who shared So much of water with him as might wet He hid himself, and hunger, toil, and cold, Month after month endured; it was a feast Whene'er he found those globes of deep-red gold Which in the woods the strawberry-tree doth bear, Suspended in their emerald atmosphere. 14 And in the roofless huts of vast morasses, All overgrown with reeds and long rank grasses, Near Vado's tower and town; and on one side Through muddy weeds the shallow sullen sea. 17. And at the utmost point stood there The relics of a weed-inwoven cot, 18. There must have lived within Marenghi's heart That fire, more warm and bright than life or hope, (Which to the martyr makes his dungeon. More joyous than the heaven's majestic cope He had tamed every newt and snake and toad, And every seagull which sailed down to drink Those . ere the death-mist went abroad. And each one, with peculiar talk and play, Wiled, not untaught, his silent time away. 20. And the marsh-meteors, like tame beasts, at night Came licking with blue tongues his veinèd feet; And he would watch them, as, like spirits bright, In many entangled figures quaint and sweet To some enchanted music they would danceUntil they vanished at the first moon-glance. 21. He mocked the stars by grouping on each weed The summer dewdrops in the golden dawn; |