Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 018.djvu/451

Rob. So said I,
When hopelessly I Giuliana loved.
Herein thou sufferest naught save what to suffer
Hath been my lot.
Reg.So ever to the cursed
The blessed say, as if 'twere consolation
Their curse hath naught of newness.
Rob.But if Christ
And his good providence wipe off one woe,—
Why not another?
Reg.Oh! why not indeed?
Why not—why not? But what are worms, that they
Should question Supreme foresight?—ay, or struggle
Against its bridle,—nay, or 'gainst its spur?—
But who art thou dost thy lot 'gainst mine set?
What—what is thine?—didst thou, then, ever love
A beautiful, bewildering, witching fiend?
Answer me that.
Rob.Ask Giuliana that.
She will say, "Yes." I dare not use of her
The name she gave herself but yesterday.
But come, what broods there in thy fancy?
Reg.Tush!
Ye talk of love's light trifling,—of hard words
By soft lips utter'd, and of bitter railing—
So bitter, it bewitcheth. I do speak
Of hell's and fate's unglotted scorn of man:
I—of the discord—of thy brother's mood
O'erstrung by doomed love's too violent hand:
I—of the madness of the monstrous brain
Stung by the whirring, whizzing form that wheels
Round me, which I must catch at and in vain,
'Tis not within my reach—. . . .What said'st thou? Fancy!
Fie—fie! I saw her with these eyeballs;—saw her—
Her, or it, or whate'er it was—as clear
As . . . . can I not see thee thus close—close—close?
Rob. O, God! my brother, shut those frenzied eyes:
I cannot face them.
Reg.No? and that's a marvel—
Is it?—ye cannot? no! how should ye?—No—
For they have faced a thing of loftier place
With looks of admiration fond, deep love,
Intensest ecstasy, and fadeless memory,
And possibly have drunk power unworldly from
That face of strange and supra-mortal beauty,
Which—wheresoever I wander, and however
I strive to escape it—yon thin unobvious air
Shapes itself to an image of. Ay! 'tis there—
Psha! look not: thou canst not behold it. I do,—
I do, and shall,—till shrouds my dying day
These eyes, this heart, this brain in senselessness.
Fly from me, fly from whom fate's book hath bann'd:
Doubt not—stay not;—I am not lonely;—with me
Have I what it is Paradise to look on,—
Hell—hell to look on—as for aye must I—
Vainly yet lovingly. Hence, brother, hence!
Or I'll hence far:—Oh, let me—let me hence
From living men, where thou, nor any friendly,
May weep to watch my young cheek fall away,
My young brow wrinkle with ceaseless secret thought,—
My young eyes straining till they become blind
With looking after—may be looking on