Thou shadowest forth that mighty shape in story,

As ocean its wrecked fanes, severe yet tender :

The light-invested angel Poesy Was drawn from the dim world to welcome thee.

And thou in painting didst transcribe all taught

By loftiest meditations; marble knew The sculptor's fearless soul-and as he wrought,

The grace of his own power and freedom grew.

And more than all, heroic, just, sublime Thou wert among the false-was this thy crime?

Yes; and on Pisa's marble walls the twine

Of direst weeds hangs garlanded-the snake

Inhabits its wrecked palaces;-in thine A beast of subtler venom now doth make

Its lair, and sits amid their glories overthrown,

And thus thy victim's fate is as thine

own.

The sweetest flowers are ever frail and rare,

And love and freedom blossoms but to wither;

And good and ill like vines entangled

are,

So that their grapes may oft be plucked together;

Divide the vintage ere thou drink, then

make

Thy heart rejoice for dead Mazenghi's sake.

No record of his crime remains in story, But if the morning bright as evening shone,

It was some high and holy deed, by glory

Pursued into forgetfulness, which won From the blind crowd he made secure and free

The patriot's meed, toil, death, and infamy.

For when by sound of trumpet was declared

A price upon his life, and there was set A penalty of blood on all who shared So much of water with him as might wet

His lips, which speech divided nothe went

Alone, as you may guess, to banishment.

Amid the mountains, like a hunted beast,

He hid himself, and hunger, cold, and toil,

Month after month endured; it was a feast

Whene'er he found those globes of deep red gold

Which in the woods the strawberrytree doth bear,

Suspended in their emerald atmosphere.

And in the roofless huts of vast mo

rasses,

Deserted by the fever-stricken serf, All overgrown with reeds and long rank grasses,

And hillocks heaped of moss-inwoven turf,

And where the huge and speckled aloe made,

Rooted in stones, a broad and pointed shade,

He housed himself. There is a point of strand

Near Veda's tower and town; and on one side

The treacherous marsh divides it from the land,

Shadowed by pine and ilex forests wide,

And on the other creeps eternally,
Through muddy weeds, the shallow,
sullen sea.
Naples, 1818.

THE WOODMAN AND THE
NIGHTINGALE.

A WOODMAN whose rough heart was out of tune

(I think such hearts yet never came to good)

Hated to hear, under the stars or moon

One nightingale in an interfluous wood Satiate the hungry dark with melody; And as a vale is watered by a flood,

WRITTEN ON HEARING THE
NEWS OF THE DEATH OF
NAPOLEON.

WHAT! alive and so bold, oh earth?
Art thou not over bold?
What! leapest thou forth as of old
In the light of thy morning mirth,
The last of the flock of the starry
fold?

Ha leapest thou forth as of old? Are not the limbs still when the ghost is fled,

And canst thou move, Napoleon being dead?

How! is not thy quick heart cold?

What spark is alive on thy hearth? How! is not his death-knell knolled,

And livest thou still, Mother Earth? Thou wert warming thy fingers old O'er the embers covered and cold Of that most fiery spirit, when it fledWhat, Mother, dost thou laugh now he is dead?

"Who has known me of old," replied Earth,

"Or who has my story told? It is thou who art over bold." And the lightning of scorn laughed forth

As she sung, "To my bosom I fold All my sons when their knell is knolled;

And so with living motion all are fed, And the quick spring like weeds out of the dead.

"Still alive and still bold," shouted Earth,

"I grow bolder and still more bold. The dead fill me ten thousand fold Fuller of speed, and splendour, and mirth,

I was cloudy, and sullen, and cold,
Like a frozen chaos uprolled,

Till by the spirit of the mighty dead
My heart grew warm. I feed on whom
I fed.

"Ay, alive, and still bold," muttered Earth,

THE WANING MOON.

AND like a dying lady, lean and pale, Who totters forth, wrapt in a gauzy veil,

Out of her chamber, led by the insane And feeble wanderings of her fading brain,

The moon arose up in the murky earth, A white and shapeless mass.

EPITAPH.

THESE are two friends whose lives were undivided,

So let their memory be, now they have glided

Under the grave; let not their bones be parted,

For their two hearts in life were single hearted.

INVOCATION TO MISERY.
COME, be happy!-sit by me,
Shadow-vested Misery:
Coy, unwilling, silent bride,
Mourning in thy robe of pride,
Desolation-deified!

Come, be happy !-sit near me:
Sad as I may seem to thee,
I am happier far than thou,
Lady, whose imperial brow
Is endiademed with woe.

Misery! we have known each other,
Like a sister and a brother
Living in the same lone home,
Many years-we must live some
Years and ages yet to come.

'Tis an evil lot, and yet
Let us make the most of it;

If love lives when pleasure dies,
We will love, till in our eyes
This heart's Hell seem Paradise.
Come, be happy!-lie thee down
On the fresh grass newly mown,
Where the grasshopper doth sing
Merrily-one joyous thing
In a world of sorrowing!

There our tent shall be the willow,
And thine arm shall be my pillow;
Sounds and odours sorrowful
Because they once were sweet, shall
lull

Us to slumber, deep and dull.
Ha! thy frozen pulses flutter
With a love thou darest not utter.

Thou art murmuring, thou art weeping,
Whilst my burning bosom's leaping.
Kiss me;-oh! thy lips are cold:
Round my neck thine arms enfold-
They are soft, but chill and dead;
And thy tears upon my head
Burn like points of frozen lead.

Hasten to the bridal bedUnderneath the grave 'tis spread: In darkness may our love be hid, Oblivion be our coverlid

We may rest, and none forbid.

Clasp me till our hearts be grown
Like two lovers into one;
Till this dreadful transport may
Like a vapour fade away,
In the sleep that lasts alway.

We may dream, in that long sleep,
That we are not those who weep;
E'en as pleasure dreams of thee,
Life-deserting Misery,

Thou mayst dream of her with me.

Let us laugh, and make our mirth,
At the shadows of the earth,
As dogs bay the moonlight clouds,
That, like spectres wrapt in shrouds,
Pass o'er night in multitudes.

All the wide world beside us
Are like multitudinous

Shadows shifting from a scene-
What but mockery may they mean?
Where am I?-Where thou hast been.

WITH A GUITAR.

THE artist who this idol wrought,
To echo all harmonious thought,
Felled a tree, while on the steep
The winds were in their winter sleep,
Rocked in that repose divine
On the wind-swept Apennine;
And dreaming some of Autumn past,
And some of Spring approaching fast,
And some of April buds and showers,
And some of songs in July bowers,
And all of love; and so this tree,—
O that such our death may be !
Died in sleep, and felt no pain,
To live in happier form again;
From which, beneath Heaven's fairest
star,

The artist wrought that loved Guitar,
And taught it justly to reply,
To all who question skilfully,
In language gentle as its own,
Whispering in enamoured tone
Sweet oracles of woods and dells,
And summer winds in sylvan cells;
For it had learnt all harmonies
Of the plains and of the skies,
Of the forests and the mountains,
And the many-voiced fountains;
The clearest echoes of the hills,
The softest notes of falling rills,
The melodies of birds and bees,
The murmuring of summer seas,
And pattering rain, and breathing dew,
And airs of evening; and it knew
That seldom-heard mysterious sound,
Which, driven in its diurnal round,
As it floats through boundless day,
Our world enkindles on its way---
All this it knows, but will not tell
To those who cannot question well
The spirit that inhabits it.
It talks according to the wit
Of its companions; and no more
Is heard than has been felt before,
By those who tempt it to betray
These secrets of an elder day:
But sweetly as its answers will
Flatter hands of perfect skill,
It keeps its highest, holiest tone,
For our beloved friend alone.

THE MAGNETIC LADY TO
HER PATIENT.

SLEEP on! sleep on! forget thy pain:

My hand is on thy brow,

My spirit on thy brain;

My pity on thy heart, poor friend;
And from my fingers flow
The powers of life, and like a sign,

Seal thee from thine hour of woe; And brood on thee, but may not blend With thine.

Sleep on! sleep on! I love thee not;
But when I think that he
Who made and makes my lot
As full of flowers as thine of weeds,
Might have been lost like thee;
And that a hand which was not mine,
Might then have chased his agony
As I another's-my heart bleeds
For thine.

Sleep, sleep, and with the slumber of
The dead and the unborn,
Forget thy life and woe;
Forget that thou must wake for ever;
Forget the world's dull scorn;
Forget lost health, and the divine
Feelings that die in youth's brief

morn;

And forget me, for I can never Be thine.

Like a cloud big with a May shower,
My soul weeps healing rain,
On thee, thou withered flower;
It breathes mute music on thy sleep;
Its odour calms thy brain!
Its light within thy gloomy breast

Speaks like a second youth again. By mine thy being is to its deep Possest.

The spell is done. How feel you now? Better-Quite well, replied

The sleeper. What would do You good when suffering and awake? What cure your head and side?— 'Twould kill me what would cure my pain;

And as I must on earth abide Awhile, yet tempt me not to break My chain.

TO THE QUEEN OF MY
HEART.

SHALL we roam, my love,
To the twilight grove,

This poem is considered doubtful; but it was published by Captain Medwin as Shelley's.