By slow horses; and unhail'd Skimming down to Camelot : Only reapers, reaping early Down to tower'd Camelot : PART II. THERE she weaves by night and day To look down to Camelot. She knows not what the curse may be, The Lady of Shalott. And moving thro' a mirror clear Winding down to Camelot : Pass onward from Shalott. Sometimes a troop of damsels glad, But in her web she still delights To weave the mirror's magic sights, For often thro' the silent nights And music, went to Camelot : PART III. A BOW-SHOT from her bower-eaves, The gemmy bridle glitter'd free, As he rode down to Camelot : All in the blue unclouded weather She saw the water-lily bloom, PART IV. IN the stormy east-wind straining, Heavily the low sky raining Over tower'd Camelot ; Down she came and found a boat The Lady of Shalott. And down the river's dim expanse Did she look to Camelot. And at the closing of the day She loosed the chain, and down she lay ; Lying, robed in snowy white She floated down to Camelot : And as the boat-head wound along The willowy hills and fields among, They heard her singing her last song, The Lady of Shalott. Heard a carol, mournful, holy, The Lady of Shalott. Under tower and balcony, Out upon the wharfs they came, Who is this? and what is here? The Lady of Shalott.' MARIANA IN THE SOUTH. WITH One black shadow at its feet, And 'Ave Mary,' night and morn, She, as her carol sadder grew, From brow and bosom slowly down Thro' rosy taper fingers drew Her streaming curls of deepest brown To left and right, and made appear Still-lighted in a secret shrine, Her melancholy eyes divine, The home of woe without a tear. And Ave Mary,' was her moan, 'Madonna, sad is night and morn,' And 'Ah,' she sang, 'to be all alone, To live forgotten, and love forlorn.' Till all the crimson changed, and past Into deep orange o'er the sea, B Low on her knees herself she cast, 'Is this the form,' she made her 'That won his praises night and morn?' And Ah,' she said, but I wake alone, I sleep forgotten, I wake forlorn.' Nor bird would sing, nor lamb would bleat, Nor any cloud would cross the vault, But day increased from heat to heat, On stony drought and steaming salt; Till now at noon she slept again, And seem'd knee-deep in mountain grass, And heard her native breezes pass, She breathed in sleep a lower moan, morn, She thought, 'My spirit is here alone, Walks forgotten, and is forlorn.' Dreaming, she knew it was a dream: She felt he was and was not there. She woke the babble of the stream Fell, and, without, the steady glare Shrank one sick willow sere and small. The river-bed was dusty-white; And all the furnace of the light Struck up against the blinding wall. She whisper'd, with a stifled moan More inward than at night or morn, 'Sweet Mother, let me not here alone Live forgotten and die forlorn.' And, rising, from her bosom drew Old letters, breathing of her worth, For Love,' they said, 'must needs be true, To what is loveliest upon earth.' An image seem'd to pass the door, To look at her with slight, and say 'But now thy beauty flows away, So be alone for evermore.' 'Ocruel heart,' she changed her tone, 'And cruel love, whose end is scorn, Is this the end to be left alone, To live forgotten, and die forlorn?' But sometimes in the falling day An image seem'd to pass the door, To look into her eyes and say, 'But thou shalt be alone no more.' And flaming downward over all From heat to heat the day decreased, And slowly rounded to the east The one black shadow from the wall. The day to night,' she made her 6 moan, 'The day to night, the night to morn, And day and night I am left alone To live forgotten, and love forlorn.' At eve a dry cicala sung, There came a sound as of the sea; Backward the lattice-blind she flung, And lean'd upon the balcony. There all in spaces rosy-bright Large Hesper glitter'd on her tears, And deepening thro' the silent spheres Heaven over Heaven rose the night. And weeping then she made her moan, 'The night comes on that knows not morn, When I shall cease to be all alone, THE TWO VOICES. A STILL Small voice spake unto me, 'Thou art so full of misery, Were it not better not to be?' Then to the still small voice I said; 'Let me not cast in endless shade What is so wonderfully made.' To which the voice did urge reply; 'To-day I saw the dragon-fly Come from the wells where he did lie. 'An inner impulse rent the veil Of his old husk: from head to tail Came out clear plates of sapphire mail. 'He dried his wings: like gauze they grew; Thro' crofts and pastures wet with dew A living flash of light he flew.' I said, 'When first the world began, Young Nature thro' five cycles ran, And in the sixth she moulded man. 'She gave him mind, the lordliest Proportion, and, above the rest, Dominion in the head and breast.' Thereto the silent voice replied; 'Self-blinded are you by your pride : Look up thro' night: the world is wide. 'This truth within thy mind rehearse, That in a boundless universe Is boundless better, boundless worse. 'Think you this mould of hopes and fears It spake, moreover, in my mind: To which he answer'd scoffingly; 'Or will one beam be less intense, When thy peculiar difference Is cancell'd in the world of sense?' I would have said, 'Thou canst not know,' Again the voice spake unto me : 'Thine anguish will not let thee sleep, Nor any train of reason keep: Thou canst not think, but thou wilt weep.' I said, 'The years with change advance: If I make dark my countenance, I shut my life from happier chance. 'Some turn this sickness yet might take, Ev'n yet.' But he: 'What drug can make A wither'd palsy cease to shake?' I wept, 'Tho' I should die, I know 'And men, thro' novel spheres of thought 'Yet,' said the secret voice, 'some time, Sooner or later, will gray prime Make thy grass hoar with early rime. 'Not less swift souls that yearn for light, Rapt after heaven's starry flight, Would sweep the tracts of day and night. 'Not less the bee would range her cells, I said that all the years invent; 'Were this not well, to bide mine hour, Tho' watching from a ruin'd tower How grows the day of human power?' 'The highest-mounted mind,' he said, 'Still sees the sacred morning spread The silent summit overhead. 'Will thirty seasons render plain Those lonely lights that still remain, Just breaking over land and main ? 'Or make that morn, from his cold crown And crystal silence creeping down, Flood with full daylight glebe and town? 'Forerun thy peers, thy time, and let Thy feet, millenniums hence, be set In midst of knowledge, dream'd not yet. |