Selected Poems and Prose

by Percy Bysshe Shelley

  55More knacks and quips there be than I am able

  To catalogize in this verse of mine:—

  A pretty bowl of wood—not full of wine,

  But quicksilver, that dew which the gnomes drink

  When at their subterranean toil they swink,

  60Pledging the daemons of the earthquake, who

  Reply to them in lava—cry halloo!

  And call out to the cities o’er their head,—

  Roofs, towers, and shrines, the dying and the dead,

  Crash through the chinks of earth—and then all quaff

  65Another rouse, and hold their sides and laugh.

  This quicksilver no gnome has drunk—within

  The walnut bowl it lies, veined and thin,

  In colour like the wake of light that stains

  The Tuscan deep, when from the moist moon rains

  70The inmost shower of its white fire—the breeze

  Is still—blue heaven smiles over the pale seas.

  And in this bowl of quicksilver—for I

  Yield to the impulse of an infancy

  Outlasting manhood—I have made to float

  75A rude idealism of a paper boat:

  A hollow screw with cogs—Henry will know

  The thing I mean and laugh at me—if so

  He fears not I should do more mischief.—Next

  Lie bills and calculations much perplexed,

  80With steamboats, frigates and machinery quaint

  Traced over them in blue and yellow paint.

  Then comes a range of mathematical

  Instruments, for plans nautical and statical;

  A heap of rosin, a queer broken glass

  85With ink in it, a china cup that was

  What it will never be again, I think,

  A thing from which sweet lips were wont to drink

  The liquor doctors rail at—and which I

  Will quaff in spite of them—and when we die

  90We’ll toss up who died first of drinking tea,

  And cry out heads or tails? where’er we be.

  Near that a dusty paint box, some odd hooks,

  A half-burnt match, an ivory block, three books

  Where conic sections, spherics, logarithms,

  95To great Laplace, from Saunderson and Sims,

  Lie heaped in their harmonious disarray

  Of figures—disentangle them who may.

  Baron de Tott’s memoirs beside them lie,

  And some odd volumes of old chemistry.

  100Near those a most inexplicable thing,

  With lead in the middle—I’m conjecturing

  How to make Henry understand—but no,

  I’ll leave, as Spenser says, with many mo,

  This secret in the pregnant womb of time,

  105Too vast a matter for so weak a rhyme.

  And here like some weird Archimage sit I,

  Plotting dark spells and devilish enginery,

  The self-impelling steam-wheels of the mind

  Which pump up oaths from clergymen, and grind

  110The gentle spirit of our meek reviews

  Into a powdery foam of salt abuse,

  Ruffling the ocean of their self-content—

  I sit, and smile or sigh as is my bent,

  But not for them—Libeccio rushes round

  115With an inconstant and an idle sound,

  I heed him more than them—the thunder-smoke

  Is gathering on the mountains, like a cloak

  Folded athwart their shoulders broad and bare;

  The ripe corn under the undulating air

  120Undulates like an ocean—and the vines

  Are trembling wide in all their trellised lines—

  The murmur of the awakening sea doth fill

  The empty pauses of the blast—the hill

  Looks hoary through the white electric rain—

  125And from the glens beyond, in sullen strain

  The interrupted thunder howls; above

  One chasm of heaven smiles, like the eye of Love

  On the unquiet world—while such things are,

  How could one worth your friendship heed the war

  130Of worms? the shriek of the world’s carrion jays,

  Their censure, or their wonder, or their praise?

  You are not here … the quaint witch Memory sees

  In vacant chairs your absent images,

  And points where once you sat, and now should be

  135But are not—I demand if ever we

  Shall meet as then we met—and she replies,

  Veiling in awe her second-sighted eyes;

  ‘I know the past alone—but summon home

  My sister Hope,— she speaks of all to come.’

  140But I, an old diviner, who know well

  Every false verse of that sweet oracle,

  Turned to the sad enchantress once again,

  And sought a respite from my gentle pain,

  In citing every passage o’er and o’er

  145Of our communion—how on the sea-shore

  We watched the ocean and the sky together

  Under the roof of blue Italian weather;

  How I ran home through last year’s thunderstorm

  And felt the transverse lightning linger warm

  150Upon my cheek—and how we often made

  Feasts for each other, where good will outweighed

  The frugal luxury of our country cheer,

  As well it might, were it less firm and clear

  Than ours must ever be;—and how we spun

  155A shroud of talk to hide us from the sun

  Of this familiar life, which seems to be

  But is not,—or is but quaint mockery

  Of all we would believe; or sadly blame

  The jarring and inexplicable frame

  160Of this wrong world;—and then anatomize

  The purposes and thoughts of men whose eyes

  Were closed in distant years—or widely guess

  The issue of the earth’s great business,

  When we shall be as we no longer are—

  165Like babbling gossips safe, who hear the war

  Of winds, and sigh, but tremble not—or how

  You listened to some interrupted flow

  Of visionary rhyme, in joy and pain

  Struck from the inmost fountains of my brain,

  170With little skill perhaps—or how we sought

  Those deepest wells of passion and of thought

  Wrought by wise poets in the waste of years,

  Staining their sacred waters with our tears,

  Quenching a thirst ever to be renewed!

  175Or how I, wisest lady! then indued

  The language of a land which now is free,

  And winged with thoughts of truth and majesty

  Flits round the tyrant’s sceptre like a cloud,

  And bursts the peopled prisons, and cries aloud,

  180‘My name is Legion!’—that majestic tongue

  Which Calderon over the desert flung

  Of ages and of nations; and which found

  An echo in our hearts, and with the sound

  Startled Oblivion—thou wert then to me

  185As is a nurse, when inarticulately

  A child would talk as its grown parents do.

  If living winds the rapid clouds pursue,

  If hawks chase doves through the etherial way,

  Huntsmen the innocent deer, and beasts their prey,

  190Why should not we rouse with the spirit’s blast

  Out of the forest of the pathless past

  These recollected pleasures?

  You are now

  In London, that great sea, whose ebb and flow

  At once is deaf and loud, and on the shore

  195Vomits its wrecks, and still howls on for more.

  Yet in its depth what treasures! You will see

  That which was Godwin,—greater none than he
r />   Though fallen—and fallen on evil times—to stand

  Among the spirits of our age and land,

  200Before the dread tribunal of to come

  The foremost—while Rebuke cowers pale and dumb.

  You will see Coleridge—he who sits obscure

  In the exceeding lustre, and the pure

  Intense irradiation of a mind,

  205Which, with its own internal lightning blind,

  Flags wearily through darkness and despair—

  A cloud-encircled meteor of the air,

  A hooded eagle among blinking owls.—

  You will see Hunt—one of those happy souls

  210Who are the salt of the earth, and without whom

  This world would smell like what it is—a tomb;

  Who is, what others seem—his room no doubt

  Is still adorned with many a cast from Shout,

  With graceful flowers tastefully placed about,

  215And coronals of bay from ribbons hung,

  And brighter wreaths in neat disorder flung,

  The gifts of the most learn’d among some dozens

  Of female friends, sisters-in-law, and cousins.

  And there is he with his eternal puns,

  220Which beat the dullest brain for smiles, like duns

  Thundering for money at a poet’s door;

  Alas! it is no use to say, ‘I’m poor!’

  Or oft in graver mood, when he will look

  Things wiser than were ever read in book,

  225Except in Shakespeare’s wisest tenderness.

  You will see Hogg—and I cannot express

  His virtues, though I know that they are great,

  Because he locks, then barricades the gate

  Within which they inhabit;—of his wit

  230And wisdom, you’ll cry out when you are bit.

  He is a pearl within an oyster shell,

  One of the richest of the deep. And there

  Is English Peacock with his mountain fair,

  Turned into a Flamingo, that shy bird

  235That gleams i’ the Indian air—have you not heard

  When a man marries, dies, or turns Hindoo,

  His best friends hear no more of him?—but you

  Will see him, and will like him too, I hope,

  With the milk-white Snowdonian antelope

  240Matched with this cameleopard.—His fine wit

  Makes such a wound, the knife is lost in it;

  A strain too learned for a shallow age,

  Too wise for selfish bigots;—let his page

  Which charms the chosen spirits of the time,

  245Fold itself up for the serener clime

  Of years to come, and find its recompense

  In that just expectation.—Wit and sense,

  Virtue and human knowledge, all that might

  Make this dull world a business of delight,

  250Are all combined in Horace Smith—and these,

  With some exceptions which I need not tease

  Your patience by descanting on,—are all

  You and I know in London.

  I recall

  My thoughts, and bid you look upon the night.

  255As water does a sponge, so the moonlight

  Fills the void, hollow, universal air—

  What see you?—unpavilioned heaven is fair

  Whether the moon, into her chamber gone,

  Leaves midnight to the golden stars, or wan

  260Climbs with diminished beams the azure steep,

  Or whether clouds sail o’er the inverse deep,

  Piloted by the many-wandering blast,

  And the rare stars rush through them dim and fast:—

  All this is beautiful in every land.—

  265But what see you beside?—a shabby stand

  Of hackney-coaches—a brick house or wall

  Fencing some lordly court, white with the scrawl

  Of our unhappy politics; or worse—

  A wretched woman reeling by, whose curse

  270Mixed with the watchman’s, partner of her trade,

  You must accept in place of serenade—

  Or yellow-haired Pollonia murmuring

  To Henry some unutterable thing.

  I see a chaos of green leaves and fruit

  275Built round dark caverns, even to the root

  Of the living stems that feed them—in whose bowers

  There sleep in their dark dew the folded flowers;

  Beyond, the surface of the unsickled corn

  Trembles not in the slumbering air, and borne

  280In circles quaint, and ever-changing dance,

  Like winged stars the fire-flies flash and glance

  Pale in the open moonshine, but each one

  Under the dark trees seems a little sun,

  A meteor tamed, a fixed star gone astray

  285From the silver regions of the Milky Way;—

  Afar the contadino’s song is heard,

  Rude, but made sweet by distance—and a bird

  Which cannot be the nightingale, and yet

  I know none else that sings so sweet as it

  290At this late hour—and then all is still—

  Now Italy or London, which you will!

  Next winter you must pass with me; I’ll have

  My house by that time turned into a grave

  Of dead despondence and low-thoughted care,

  295And all the dreams which our tormentors are.

  Oh! that Hunt, Hogg, Peacock and Smith were there,

  With everything belonging to them fair!—

  We will have books, Spanish, Italian, Greek;

  And ask one week to make another week

  300As like his father as I’m unlike mine,

  Which is not his fault, as you may divine.

  Though we eat little flesh and drink no wine,

  Yet let’s be merry: we’ll have tea and toast,

  Custards for supper, and an endless host

  305Of syllabubs and jellies and mince pies,

  And other such lady-like luxuries—

  Feasting on which we will philosophize!

  And we’ll have fires out of the Grand Duke’s wood

  To thaw the six weeks’ winter in our blood.

  310And then we’ll talk—what shall we talk about?

  Oh! there are themes enough for many a bout

  Of thought-entangled descant;—as to nerves,

  With cones and parallelograms and curves

  I’ve sworn to strangle them if once they dare

  315To bother me—when you are with me there,

  And they shall never more sip laudanum

  From Helicon or Himeros;*—well, come,

  And in despite of God and of the devil,

  We’ll make our friendly philosophic revel

  320Outlast the leafless time—till buds and flowers

  Warn the obscure inevitable hours

  Sweet meeting by sad parting to renew—

  ‘Tomorrow to fresh woods and pastures new.’

  To —– [the Lord Chancellor]

  Thy country’s curse is on thee, darkest Crest

  Of that foul, knotted, many-headed worm

  Which rends our mother’s bosom!—Priestly Pest!

  Masked Resurrection of a buried form!

  5Thy country’s curse is on thee—Justice sold,

  Truth trampled, Nature’s landmarks overthrown,

  And heaps of fraud-accumulated gold

  Plead, loud as thunder, at destruction’s throne.

  And whilst that sure, slow Fate which ever stands

  10 Watching the beck of Mutability

  Delays to execute her high commands

  And, though a nation weeps, spares thine and thee—

  O let a father’s curse be on thy soul

  And let a daughter’s hope be on thy tomb;

  15Be both, on thy grey head, a leaden cowl

  To weigh thee down to thine
approaching doom.

  I curse thee! By a parent’s outraged love,—

  By hopes long cherished and too lately lost,—

  By gentle feelings thou couldst never prove,

  20 By griefs which thy stern nature never crossed;

  By those infantine smiles of happy light

  Which were a fire within a stranger’s hearth

  Quenched even when kindled, in untimely night

  Hiding the promise of a lovely birth—

  25By those unpractised accents of young speech

  Which he who is a father thought to frame

  To gentlest lore, such as the wisest teach—

  Thou strike the lyre of mind!—oh grief and shame!

  By all the happy see in children’s growth,

  30 That undeveloped flower of budding years—

  Sweetness and sadness interwoven both,

  Source of the sweetest hopes, the saddest fears—

  By all the days under a hireling’s care

  Of dull constraint and bitter heaviness—

  35Oh wretched ye, if any ever were—

  Sadder than orphans—why not fatherless?

  By the false cant which on their innocent lips

  Must hang like poison on an opening bloom,

  By the dark creeds which cover with eclipse

  40 Their pathway from the cradle to the tomb—

  By thy complicity with lust and hate:

  Thy thirst for tears—thy hunger after gold—

  The ready frauds which ever on thee wait—

  The servile arts in which thou hast grown old.—

  45By thy most killing sneer, and by thy smile—

  By all the snares and nets of thy black den;

  And—(for thou canst outweep the crocodile)—

  By thy false tears—those millstones braining men—

  By all the hate which checks a father’s love,

  50 By all the scorn which kills a father’s care,

  By those most impious hands which dared remove

  Nature’s high bounds—by thee—and by despair—

  Yes—the despair which bids a father groan

  And cry—‘My children are no longer mine—

  55The blood within their veins may be mine own

  But, Tyrant, their polluted souls are thine’;—

  I curse thee, though I hate thee not.— O, slave!

  If thou couldst quench that earth-consuming Hell

  Of which thou art a daemon, on thy grave

  60 This curse should be a blessing—Fare thee well!

  THE WITCH OF ATLAS

  To Mary

  (on her objecting to the following poem, upon the score of its containing no human interest)