FullReads

16.
And odours in a kind of aviary
Of ever-blooming Eden-trees she kept, 170
Clipped in a floating net, a love-sick Fairy
Had woven from dew-beams while the moon yet slept;
As bats at the wired window of a dairy,
They beat their vans; and each was an adept,
When loosed and missioned, making wings of winds, 175
To stir sweet thoughts or sad, in destined minds.

17.
And liquors clear and sweet, whose healthful might
Could medicine the sick soul to happy sleep,
And change eternal death into a night
Of glorious dreams–or if eyes needs must weep, 180
Could make their tears all wonder and delight,
She in her crystal vials did closely keep:
If men could drink of those clear vials, ’tis said
The living were not envied of the dead.

18.
Her cave was stored with scrolls of strange device, 185
The works of some Saturnian Archimage,
Which taught the expiations at whose price
Men from the Gods might win that happy age
Too lightly lost, redeeming native vice;
And which might quench the Earth-consuming rage 190
Of gold and blood–till men should live and move
Harmonious as the sacred stars above;

19.
And how all things that seem untameable,
Not to be checked and not to be confined,
Obey the spells of Wisdom’s wizard skill; 195
Time, earth, and fire–the ocean and the wind,
And all their shapes–and man’s imperial will;
And other scrolls whose writings did unbind
The inmost lore of Love–let the profane
Tremble to ask what secrets they contain. 200

20.
And wondrous works of substances unknown,
To which the enchantment of her father’s power
Had changed those ragged blocks of savage stone,
Were heaped in the recesses of her bower;
Carved lamps and chalices, and vials which shone 205
In their own golden beams–each like a flower,
Out of whose depth a fire-fly shakes his light
Under a cypress in a starless night.

21.
At first she lived alone in this wild home,
And her own thoughts were each a minister, 210
Clothing themselves, or with the ocean foam,
Or with the wind, or with the speed of fire,
To work whatever purposes might come
Into her mind; such power her mighty Sire
Had girt them with, whether to fly or run, 215
Through all the regions which he shines upon.

22.
The Ocean-nymphs and Hamadryades,
Oreads and Naiads, with long weedy locks,
Offered to do her bidding through the seas,
Under the earth, and in the hollow rocks, 220
And far beneath the matted roots of trees,
And in the gnarled heart of stubborn oaks,
So they might live for ever in the light
Of her sweet presence–each a satellite.

23.
‘This may not be,’ the wizard maid replied; 225
‘The fountains where the Naiades bedew
Their shining hair, at length are drained and dried;
The solid oaks forget their strength, and strew
Their latest leaf upon the mountains wide;
The boundless ocean like a drop of dew 230
Will be consumed–the stubborn centre must
Be scattered, like a cloud of summer dust.