Safely fled—

350As if that frail and wasted human form,

Had been an elemental god.

                                    At midnight

The moon arose: and lo! the etherial cliffs

Of Caucasus, whose icy summits shone

Among the stars like sunlight, and around

355Whose cavern’d base the whirlpools and the waves

Bursting and eddying irresistibly

Rage and resound for ever.—Who shall save?—

The boat fled on,—the boiling torrent drove,—

The crags closed round with black and jagged arms,

360The shattered mountain overhung the sea,

And faster still, beyond all human speed,

Suspended on the sweep of the smooth wave,

The little boat was driven. A cavern there

Yawned, and amid its slant and winding depths

365Ingulphed the rushing sea. The boat fled on

With unrelaxing speed.—‘Vision and Love!’

The Poet cried aloud, ‘I have beheld

The path of thy departure. Sleep and death

Shall not divide us long!’

                                 The boat pursued

370The windings of the cavern. Day-light shone

At length upon that gloomy river’s flow;

Now, where the fiercest war among the waves

Is calm, on the unfathomable stream

The boat moved slowly. Where the mountain, riven,

375Exposed those black depths to the azure sky,

Ere yet the flood’s enormous volume fell

Even to the base of Caucasus, with sound

That shook the everlasting rocks, the mass

Filled with one whirlpool all that ample chasm;

380Stair above stair the eddying waters rose,

Circling immeasurably fast, and laved

With alternating dash the knarled roots

Of mighty trees, that stretched their giant arms

In darkness over it. I’ the midst was left,

385Reflecting, yet distorting every cloud,

A pool of treacherous and tremendous calm.

Seized by the sway of the ascending stream,

With dizzy swiftness, round, and round, and round,

Ridge after ridge the straining boat arose,

390Till on the verge of the extremest curve,

Where, through an opening of the rocky bank,

The waters overflow, and a smooth spot

Of glassy quiet mid those battling tides

Is left, the boat paused shuddering.—Shall it sink

395Down the abyss? Shall the reverting stress

Of that resistless gulph embosom it?

Now shall it fall?—A wandering stream of wind,

Breathed from the west, has caught the expanded sail,

And, lo! with gentle motion, between banks

400Of mossy slope, and on a placid stream,

Beneath a woven grove it sails, and, hark!

The ghastly torrent mingles its far roar

With the breeze murmuring in the musical woods.

Where the embowering trees recede, and leave

405A little space of green expanse, the cove

Is closed by meeting banks, whose yellow flowers

For ever gaze on their own drooping eyes,

Reflected in the crystal calm. The wave

Of the boat’s motion marred their pensive task,

410Which nought but vagrant bird, or wanton wind,

Or falling spear-grass, or their own decay

Had e’er disturbed before. The Poet longed

To deck with their bright hues his withered hair,

But on his heart its solitude returned,

415And he forbore. Not the strong impulse hid

In those flushed cheeks, bent eyes, and shadowy frame,

Had yet performed its ministry: it hung

Upon his life, as lightning in a cloud

Gleams, hovering ere it vanish, ere the floods

420Of night close over it.

                              The noonday sun

Now shone upon the forest, one vast mass

Of mingling shade, whose brown magnificence

A narrow vale embosoms. There, huge caves,

Scooped in the dark base of their aëry rocks

425Mocking its moans, respond and roar for ever.

The meeting boughs and implicated leaves

Wove twilight o’er the Poet’s path, as led

By love, or dream, or god, or mightier Death,

He sought in Nature’s dearest haunt, some bank,

430Her cradle, and his sepulchre. More dark

And dark the shades accumulate. The oak,

Expanding its immense and knotty arms,

Embraces the light beech. The pyramids

Of the tall cedar overarching, frame

435Most solemn domes within, and far below,

Like clouds suspended in an emerald sky,

The ash and the acacia floating hang

Tremulous and pale. Like restless serpents, clothed

In rainbow and in fire, the parasites,

440Starred with ten thousand blossoms, flow around

The gray trunks, and, as gamesome infants’ eyes,

With gentle meanings, and most innocent wiles,

Fold their beams round the hearts of those that love,

These twine their tendrils with the wedded boughs

445Uniting their close union; the woven leaves

Make net-work of the dark blue light of day,

And the night’s noontide clearness, mutable

As shapes in the weird clouds. Soft mossy lawns

Beneath these canopies extend their swells,

450Fragrant with perfumed herbs, and eyed with blooms

Minute yet beautiful. One darkest glen

Sends from its woods of musk-rose, twined with jasmine,

A soul-dissolving odour, to invite

To some more lovely mystery. Through the dell,

455Silence and Twilight here, twin-sisters, keep

Their noonday watch, and sail among the shades,

Like vaporous shapes half seen; beyond, a well,

Dark, gleaming, and of most translucent wave,

Images all the woven boughs above,

460And each depending leaf, and every speck

Of azure sky, darting between their chasms;

Nor aught else in the liquid mirror laves

Its portraiture, but some inconstant star

Between one foliaged lattice twinkling fair,

465Or, painted bird, sleeping beneath the moon,

Or gorgeous insect floating motionless,

Unconscious of the day, ere yet his wings

Have spread their glories to the gaze of noon.

   Hither the Poet came. His eyes beheld

470Their own wan light through the reflected lines

Of his thin hair, distinct in the dark depth

Of that still fountain; as the human heart,

Gazing in dreams over the gloomy grave,

Sees its own treacherous likeness there. He heard

475The motion of the leaves, the grass that sprung

Startled and glanced and trembled even to feel

An unaccustomed presence, and the sound

Of the sweet brook that from the secret springs

Of that dark fountain rose. A Spirit seemed

480To stand beside him—clothed in no bright robes

Of shadowy silver or enshrining light,

Borrowed from aught the visible world affords

Of grace, or majesty, or mystery;—

But, undulating woods, and silent well,

485And leaping rivulet, and evening gloom

Now deepening the dark shades, for speech assuming

Held commune with him, as if he and it

Were all that was,—only … when his regard

Was raised by intense pensiveness,… two eyes,

490Two starry eyes, hung in the gloom of thought,

And seemed with their serene and azure smiles

To beckon him.

                     Obedient to the light

That shone within his soul, he went, pursuing

The windings of the dell.—The rivulet

495Wanton and wild, through many a green ravine

Beneath the forest flowed. Sometimes it fell

Among the moss with hollow harmony

Dark and profound. Now on the polished stones

It danced; like childhood laughing as it went:

500Then, through the plain in tranquil wanderings crept,

Reflecting every herb and drooping bud

That overhung its quietness.—‘O stream!

Whose source is inaccessibly profound,

Whither do thy mysterious waters tend?

505Thou imagest my life. Thy darksome stillness,

Thy dazzling waves, thy loud and hollow gulphs,

Thy searchless fountain, and invisible course

Have each their type in me: and the wide sky,

And measureless ocean may declare as soon

510What oozy cavern or what wandering cloud

Contains thy waters, as the universe

Tell where these living thoughts reside, when stretched

Upon thy flowers my bloodless limbs shall waste

I’ the passing wind!’

                           Beside the grassy shore

515Of the small stream he went; he did impress

On the green moss his tremulous step, that caught

Strong shuddering from his burning limbs. As one

Roused by some joyous madness from the couch

Of fever, he did move; yet, not like him,

520Forgetful of the grave, where, when the flame

Of his frail exultation shall be spent,

He must descend. With rapid steps he went

Beneath the shade of trees, beside the flow

Of the wild babbling rivulet, and now

525The forest’s solemn canopies were changed

For the uniform and lightsome evening sky.

Gray rocks did peep from the spare moss, and stemmed

The struggling brook: tall spires of windlestrae

Threw their thin shadows down the rugged slope,

530And nought but knarled roots of ancient pines

Branchless and blasted, clenched with grasping roots

The unwilling soil. A gradual change was here,

Yet ghastly. For, as fast years flow away,

The smooth brow gathers, and the hair grows thin

535And white, and where irradiate dewy eyes

Had shone, gleam stony orbs:—so from his steps

Bright flowers departed, and the beautiful shade

Of the green groves, with all their odorous winds

And musical motions. Calm, he still pursued

540The stream, that with a larger volume now

Rolled through the labyrinthine dell; and there

Fretted a path through its descending curves

With its wintry speed. On every side now rose

Rocks, which, in unimaginable forms,

545Lifted their black and barren pinnacles

In the light of evening, and its precipice

Obscuring the ravine, disclosed above,

Mid toppling stones, black gulphs and yawning caves,

Whose windings gave ten thousand various tongues

550To the loud stream.