The Revolt of Islam/Canto IX

by Percy Bysshe Shelley

I.

  'That night we anchored in a woody bay,
  And sleep no more around us dared to hover
  Than, when all doubt and fear has passed away,
  It shades the couch of some unresting lover
  Whose heart is now at rest; thus night passed over
  In mutual joy; around, a forest grew
  Of poplars and dark oaks, whose shade did cover
  The waning stars pranked in the waters blue,
And trembled in the wind which from the morning flew.

II.

  'The joyous mariners and each free maiden
  Now brought from the deep forest many a bough,
  With woodland spoil most innocently laden;
  Soon wreaths of budding foliage seemed to flow
  Over the mast and sails; the stern and prow
  Were canopied with blooming boughs; the while
  On the slant sun's path o'er the waves we go
  Rejoicing, like the dwellers of an isle
Doomed to pursue those waves that cannot cease to smile.

III.

 'The many ships spotting the dark blue deep
  With snowy sails, fled fast as ours came nigh,
  In fear and wonder; and on every steep
  Thousands did gaze. They heard the startling cry,
  Like earth's own voice lifted unconquerably
  To all her children, the unbounded mirth,
  The glorious joy of thy name—Liberty!
  They heard!—As o'er the mountains of the earth
From peak to peak leap on the beams of morning's birth,

IV.

 'So from that cry over the boundless hills
  Sudden was caught one universal sound,
  Like a volcano's voice whose thunder fills
  Remotest skies,—such glorious madness found
  A path through human hearts with stream which drowned
  Its struggling fears and cares, dark Custom's brood;
  They knew not whence it came, but felt around
  A wide contagion poured—they called aloud
On Liberty—that name lived on the sunny flood.

V.

 'We reached the port. Alas! from many spirits
  The wisdom which had waked that cry was fled,
  Like the brief glory which dark Heaven inherits
  From the false dawn, which fades ere it is spread,
  Upon the night's devouring darkness shed;
  Yet soon bright day will burst—even like a chasm
  Of fire, to burn the shrouds outworn and dead
  Which wrap the world; a wide enthusiasm,
To cleanse the fevered world as with an earthquake's spasm!

VI.

 'I walked through the great City then, but free
  From shame or fear; those toil-worn mariners
  And happy maidens did encompass me;
  And like a subterranean wind that stirs
  Some forest among caves, the hopes and fears
  From every human soul a murmur strange
  Made as I passed; and many wept with tears
  Of joy and awe, and wingèd thoughts did range,
And half-extinguished words which prophesied of change.

VII.

  'For with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
  Nature, and Truth, and Liberty, and Love,—
  As one who from some mountain's pyramid
  Points to the unrisen sun! the shades approve
  His truth, and flee from every stream and grove.
  Thus, gentle thoughts did many a bosom fill,
  Wisdom the mail of tried affections wove
  For many a heart, and tameless scorn of ill
Thrice steeped in molten steel the unconquerable will.

VIII.

 'Some said I was a maniac wild and lost;
  Some, that I scarce had risen from the grave
  The Prophet's virgin bride, a heavenly ghost;
  Some said I was a fiend from my weird cave,
  Who had stolen human shape, and o'er the wave,
  The forest, and the mountain, came; some said
  I was the child of God, sent down to save
  Woman from bonds and death, and on my head
The burden of their sins would frightfully be laid.

IX.

 'But soon my human words found sympathy
  In human hearts; the purest and the best,
  As friend with friend, made common cause with me,
  And they were few, but resolute; the rest,
  Ere yet success the enterprise had blessed,
  Leagued with me in their hearts; their meals, their slumber,
  Their hourly occupations, were possessed
  By hopes which I had armed to overnumber
Those hosts of meaner cares which life's strong wings encumber.

X.

 'But chiefly women, whom my voice did waken
  From their cold, careless, willing slavery,
  Sought me; one truth their dreary prison has shaken,
  They looked around, and lo! they became free!
  Their many tyrants, sitting desolately
  In slave-deserted halls, could none restrain;
  For wrath's red fire had withered in the eye
  Whose lightning once was death,—nor fear nor gain
Could tempt one captive now to lock another's chain.

XI.

 'Those who were sent to bind me wept, and felt
  Their minds outsoar the bonds which clasped them round,
  Even as a waxen shape may waste and melt
  In the white furnace; and a visioned swound,
  A pause of hope and awe, the City bound,
  Which, like the silence of a tempest's birth,
  When in its awful shadow it has wound
  The sun, the wind, the ocean, and the earth,
Hung terrible, ere yet the lightnings have leaped forth.

XII.

 'Like clouds inwoven in the silent sky
  By winds from distant regions meeting there,
  In the high name of Truth and Liberty
  Around the City millions gathered were
  By hopes which sprang from many a hidden lair,—
  Words which the lore of truth in hues of grace
  Arrayed, thine own wild songs which in the air
  Like homeless odors floated, and the name
Of thee, and many a tongue which thou hadst dipped in flame.

XIII.

 'The Tyrant knew his power was gone, but Fear,
  The nurse of Vengeance, bade him wait the event—
  That perfidy and custom, gold and prayer,
  And whatsoe'er, when Force is impotent,
  To Fraud the sceptre of the world has lent,
  Might, as he judged, confirm his failing sway.
  Therefore throughout the streets, the Priests he sent
  To curse the rebels. To their gods did they
For Earthquake, Plague and Want, kneel in the public way.

XIV.

 'And grave and hoary men were bribed to tell,
  From seats where law is made the slave of wrong,
  How glorious Athens in her splendor fell,
  Because her sons were free,—and that among
  Mankind, the many to the few belong
  By Heaven, and Nature, and Necessity.
  They said, that age was truth, and that the young
  Marred with wild hopes the peace of slavery,
With which old times and men had quelled the vain and free.

XV.

 'And with the falsehood of their poisonous lips
  They breathed on the enduring memory
  Of sages and of bards a brief eclipse.
  There was one teacher, who necessity
  Had armed with strength and wrong against mankind,
  His slave and his avenger aye to be;
  That we were weak and sinful, frail and blind,
  And that the will of one was peace, and we
Should seek for nought on earth but toil and misery—

XVI.

 '"For thus we might avoid the hell hereafter."
  So spake the hypocrites, who cursed and lied.
  Alas, their sway was passed, and tears and laughter
  Clung to their hoary hair, withering the pride
  Which in their hollow hearts dared still abide;
  And yet obscener slaves with smoother brow,
  And sneers on their strait lips, thin, blue and wide,
  Said that the rule of men was over now,
And hence the subject world to woman's will must bow.

XVII.

 'And gold was scattered through the streets, and wine
  Flowed at a hundred feasts within the wall.
  In vain! the steady towers in Heaven did shine
  As they were wont, nor at the priestly call
  Left Plague her banquet in the Æthiop's hall,
  Nor Famine from the rich man's portal came,
  Where at her ease she ever preys on all
  Who throng to kneel for food; nor fear, nor shame,
Nor faith, nor discord, dimmed hope's newly kindled flame.

XVIII.

  'For gold was as a god whose faith began
  To fade, so that its worshippers were few;
  And Faith itself, which in the heart of man
  Gives shape, voice, name, to spectral Terror, knew
  Its downfall, as the altars lonelier grew,
  Till the Priests stood alone within the fane;
  The shafts of falsehood unpolluting flew,
  And the cold sneers of calumny were vain
The union of the free with discord's brand to stain.

XIX.

  'The rest thou knowest.—Lo! we two are here—
  We have survived a ruin wide and deep—
  Strange thoughts are mine. I cannot grieve or fear.
  Sitting with thee upon this lonely steep
  I smile, though human love should make me weep.
  We have survived a joy that knows no sorrow,
  And I do feel a mighty calmness creep
  Over my heart, which can no longer borrow
Its hues from chance or change, dark children of to-morrow.

XX.

 'We know not what will come. Yet, Laon, dearest,
  Cythna shall be the prophetess of Love;
  Her lips shall rob thee of the grace thou wearest,
  To hide thy heart, and clothe the shapes which rove
  Within the homeless Future's wintry grove;
  For I now, sitting thus beside thee, seem
  Even with thy breath and blood to live and move,
  And violence and wrong are as a dream
Which rolls from steadfast truth,—an unreturning stream.

XXI.

 'The blasts of Autumn drive the wingèd seeds
  Over the earth; next come the snows, and rain,
  And frosts, and storms, which dreary Winter leads
  Out of his Scythian cave, a savage train.
  Behold! Spring sweeps over the world again,
  Shedding soft dews from her ethereal wings;
  Flowers on the mountains, fruits over the plain,
  And music on the waves and woods she flings,
And love on all that lives, and calm on lifeless things.

XXII.

 'O Spring, of hope and love and youth and gladness
  Wind-wingèd emblem! brightest, best and fairest!
  Whence comest thou, when, with dark Winter's sadness
  The tears that fade in sunny smiles thou sharest?
  Sister of joy! thou art the child who wearest
  Thy mother's dying smile, tender and sweet;
  Thy mother Autumn, for whose grave thou bearest
  Fresh flowers, and beams like flowers, with gentle feet,
Disturbing not the leaves which are her winding sheet.

XXIII.

 'Virtue and Hope and Love, like light and Heaven,
  Surround the world. We are their chosen slaves.
  Has not the whirlwind of our spirit driven
  Truth's deathless germs to thought's remotest caves?
  Lo, Winter comes!—the grief of many graves,
  The frost of death, the tempest of the sword,
  The flood of tyranny, whose sanguine waves
  Stagnate like ice at Faith the enchanter's word,
And bind all human hearts in its repose abhorred.

XXIV.

  'The seeds are sleeping in the soil. Meanwhile
  The Tyrant peoples dungeons with his prey;
  Pale victims on the guarded scaffold smile
  Because they cannot speak; and, day by day,
  The moon of wasting Science wanes away
  Among her stars, and in that darkness vast
  The sons of earth to their foul idols pray,
  And gray Priests triumph, and like blight or blast
A shade of selfish care o'er human looks is cast.

XXV.

 'This is the Winter of the world; and here
  We die, even as the winds of Autumn fade,
  Expiring in the frore and foggy air.
  Behold! Spring comes, though we must pass who made
  The promise of its birth,—even as the shade
  Which from our death, as from a mountain, flings
  The future, a broad sunrise; thus arrayed
  As with the plumes of overshadowing wings,
From its dark gulf of chains Earth like an eagle springs.

XXVI.

 'O dearest love! we shall be dead and cold
  Before this morn may on the world arise.
  Wouldst thou the glory of its dawn behold?
  Alas! gaze not on me, but turn thine eyes
  On thine own heart—it is a Paradise
  Which everlasting spring has made its own,
  And while drear winter fills the naked skies,
  Sweet streams of sunny thought, and flowers fresh blown,
Are there, and weave their sounds and odors into one.

XXVII.

 'In their own hearts the earnest of the hope
  Which made them great the good will ever find;
  And though some envious shade may interlope
  Between the effect and it, One comes behind,
  Who aye the future to the past will bind—
  Necessity, whose sightless strength forever
  Evil with evil, good with good, must wind
  In bands of union, which no power may sever;
They must bring forth their kind, and be divided never!

XXVIII.

 'The good and mighty of departed ages
  Are in their graves, the innocent and free,
  Heroes, and Poets, and prevailing Sages,
  Who leave the vesture of their majesty
  To adorn and clothe this naked world;—and we
  Are like to them—such perish, but they leave
  All hope, or love, or truth, or liberty,
  Whose forms their mighty spirits could conceive,
To be a rule and law to ages that survive.

XXIX.

 'So be the turf heaped over our remains
  Even in our happy youth, and that strange lot,
  Whate'er it be, when in these mingling veins
  The blood is still, be ours; let sense and thought
  Pass from our being, or be numbered not
  Among the things that are; let those who come
  Behind, for whom our steadfast will has bought
  A calm inheritance, a glorious doom,
Insult with careless tread our undivided tomb.

XXX.

 'Our many thoughts and deeds, our life and love,
  Our happiness, and all that we have been,
  Immortally must live and burn and move
  When we shall be no more;—the world has seen
  A type of peace; and as some most serene
  And lovely spot to a poor maniac's eye—
  After long years some sweet and moving scene
  Of youthful hope returning suddenly—
Quells his long madness, thus Man shall remember thee.

XXXI.

 'And Calumny meanwhile shall feed on us
  As worms devour the dead, and near the throne
  And at the altar most accepted thus
  Shall sneers and curses be;—what we have done
  None shall dare vouch, though it be truly known;
  That record shall remain when they must pass
  Who built their pride on its oblivion,
  And fame, in human hope which sculptured was,
Survive the perished scrolls of unenduring brass.

XXXII.

 'The while we two, belovèd, must depart,
  And Sense and Reason, those enchanters fair,
  Whose wand of power is hope, would bid the heart
  That gazed beyond the wormy grave despair;
  These eyes, these lips, this blood, seems darkly there
  To fade in hideous ruin; no calm sleep,
  Peopling with golden dreams the stagnant air,
  Seems our obscure and rotting eyes to steep
In joy;—but senseless death—a ruin dark and deep!

XXXIII.

 'These are blind fancies. Reason cannot know
  What sense can neither feel nor thought conceive;
  There is delusion in the world—and woe,
  And fear, and pain—we know not whence we live,
  Or why, or how, or what mute Power may give
  Their being to each plant, and star, and beast,
  Or even these thoughts.—Come near me! I do weave
  A chain I cannot break—I am possessed
With thoughts too swift and strong for one lone human breast.

XXXIV.

 'Yes, yes—thy kiss is sweet, thy lips are warm—
  Oh, willingly, belovèd, would these eyes
  Might they no more drink being from thy form,
  Even as to sleep whence we again arise,
  Close their faint orbs in death. I fear nor prize
  Aught that can now betide, unshared by thee.
  Yes, Love when Wisdom fails makes Cythna wise;
  Darkness and death, if death be true, must be
Dearer than life and hope if unenjoyed with thee.

XXXV.

 'Alas! our thoughts flow on with stream whose waters
  Return not to their fountain; Earth and Heaven,
  The Ocean and the Sun, the clouds their daughters,
  Winter, and Spring, and Morn, and Noon, and Even—
  All that we are or know, is darkly driven
  Towards one gulf.—Lo! what a change is come
  Since I first spake—but time shall be forgiven,
  Though it change all but thee!' She ceased—night's gloom
Meanwhile had fallen on earth from the sky's sunless dome.

XXXVI.

  Though she had ceased, her countenance uplifted
  To Heaven still spake with solemn glory bright;
  Her dark deep eyes, her lips, whose motions gifted
  The air they breathed with love, her locks undight;
  'Fair star of life and love,' I cried, 'my soul's delight,
  Why lookest thou on the crystalline skies?
  Oh, that my spirit were yon Heaven of night,
  Which gazes on thee with its thousand eyes!'
She turned to me and smiled—that smile was Paradise!