I AM a Goddess of the ambrosial courts, And save by Here, Queen of Pride, surpassed By none whose temples whiten this the world. Thro' Heaven I roll my lucid moon along;
shed in Hell o'er my pale people peace;
On Earth, I, caring for the creatures, guard Each pregnant yellow wolf and fox-bitch sleek, And every feathered mother's callow brood, And all that love green haunts and loneliness. Of men, the chaste adore me, hanging crowns Of poppies red to blackness, bell and stem, Upon my image at Athenai here;
And this dead Youth, Asclepios bends above, Was dearest to me. He my buskined step To follow thro' the wild-wood leafy ways, And chase the panting stag, or swift with darts Stop the swift ounce, or lay the leopard low, Neglected homage to another God: Whence Aphrodite, by no midnight smoke Of tapers lulled, in jealousy dispatched A noisome lust that, as the gadbee stings, Possessed his stepdame Phaidra for himself The son of Theseus her great absent spouse. Hippolutos exclaiming in his rage
Against the miserable Queen, she judged Life insupportable, and, pricked at heart An Amazonian stranger's race should dare To scorn her, perished by the murderous cord: Yet, ere she perished, blasted in a scroll The fame of him her swerving made not swerve, Which Theseus read, returning, and believed, So, exiled in the blindness of his wrath, The man without a crime, who, last as first, Loyal, divulged not to his sire the truth. Now Theseus from Poseidon had obtained That of his wishes should be granted Three And this he imprecated straight-alive May ne'er Hippolutos reach other lands! Poseidon heard, ai ai! And scarce the prince Had stepped into the fixed boots of the car, That give the feet a stay against the strength
Of the Henetian horses, and around
His body flung the reins, and urged their speed Along the rocks and shingles of the shore, When from the gaping wave a monster flung His obscene body in the coursers' path! These, mad with terror as the sea-bull sprawled Wallowing about their feet, lost care of him That reared them; and the master-chariot-pole Snapping beneath their plunges like a reed, Hippolutos, whose feet were trammelled fast, Was yet dragged forward by the circling rein Which either hand directed; nor was quenched The frenzy of that flight before each trace, Wheel-spoke and splinter of the woeful car, Each boulder-stone, sharp stub, and spiny shell, Huge fish-bone wrecked and wreathed amid the sands On that detested beach, was bright with blood And morsels of his flesh: then fell the steeds Head-foremost, crashing in their mooned fronts, Shivering with sweat, each white eye horror-fixed. His people, who had witnessed all afar,
Bore back the ruins of Hippolutos.
But when his sire, too swoln with pride, rejoiced, (Indomitable as a man foredoomed)
That vast Poseidon had fulfilled his prayer, I, in a flood of glory visible,
Stood o'er my dying votary, and deed
By deed revealed, as all took place, the truth.
Then Theseus lay the woefullest of men,
And worthily; but ere the death-veils hid
His face, the murdered prince full pardon breathed To his rash sire. Whereat Athenai wails.
So I, who ne'er forsake my votaries, Lest in the cross-way none the honey-cake Should tender, not pour out the dog's hot life; Lest at my fane the priests disconsolate Should dress my image with some faded poor Few crowns, made favours of, nor dare object Such slackness to my worshippers who turn The trusting heart and loaded hand elsewhere, As they had climbed Oulumpos to report
Of Artemis and nowhere found her throne
I interposed and, this eventful night,
While round the funeral pyre the populace
Stood with fierce light on their black robes that blind Each sobbing head, while yet their hair they clipped O'er the dead body of their withered prince, And, in his palace, Theseus prostrated
On the cold hearth, his brow cold as the slab 'Twas bruised on, groaned away the heavy grief- As the pyre fell, and down the cross logs crashed, Sending a crowd of sparkles thro' the night, And the gay fire, elate with mastery, Towered like a serpent o'er the clotted jars Of wine, dissolving oils and frankincense, And splendid gums, like gold,—my potency Conveyed the perished man to my retreat In the thrice venerable forest here.
And this white-bearded Sage who squeezes now The berried plant, is Phoibos' son of fame, Asclepios, whom my radiant brother taught The doctrine of each herb and flower and root, To know their secret'st virtue and express The saving soul of all-who so has soothed With lavers the torn brow and murdered cheeks, Composed the hair and brought its gloss again, And called the red bloom to the pale skin back, And laid the strips and jagged ends of flesh Even once more, and slacked the sinew's knot Of every tortured limb-that now he lies As if mere sleep possessed him underneath These interwoven oaks and pines. Oh, cheer, Divine presenter of the healing rod
Thy snake, with ardent throat and lulling eye, Twines his lithe spires around! I say, much cheer! Proceed thou with thy wisest pharmacies!
And ye, white crowd of woodland sister-nymphs, Ply, as the Sage directs, these buds and leaves That strew the turf around the Twain! While I Await, in fitting silence, the event.
WHAT's become of Waring Since he gave us all the slip,
Chose land-travel or seafaring,
Boots and chest, or staff and scrip, Rather than pace up and down Any longer London-town?
Who'd have guessed it from his lip, Or his brow's accustomed bearing, On the night he thus took ship, Or started landward ?-little caring For us, it seems, who supped together, (Friends of his too, I remember)
And walked home thro' the merry weather, The snowiest in all December;
I left his arm that night myself
For what's-his-name's the new prose-poct, That wrote the book there, on the shelf- How, forsooth, was I to know it If Waring meant to glide away Like a ghost at break of day? Never looked he half so gay!
He was prouder than the Devil : How he must have cursed our revel! Ay, and many other meetings, Indoor visits, outdoor greetings,
As up and down he paced this London, With no work done, but great works undone, Where scarce twenty knew his name.
Why not, then, have earlier spoken, Written, bustled? Who's to blame If your silence kept unbroken?
"True, but there were sundry jottings,
66 Stray-leaves, fragments, blurrs and blottings, "Certain first steps were achieved
Already which ". -(is that your meaning?)
"Had well borne out whoe'er believed
"In more to come!' But who goes gleaning Hedge-side chance-blades, while full-sheaved Stand cornfields by him? Pride, o'erweening Pride alone, puts forth such claims O'er the day's distinguished names.
Meantime, how much I loved him, I find out now I've lost him: I, who cared not if I moved him, Who could so carelessly accost him, Henceforth never shall get free Of his ghostly company, His eyes that just a little wink As deep I go into the merit
Of this and that distinguished spirit- His cheeks' raised colour, soon to sink, As long I dwell on some stupendous And tremendous (Heaven defend us!) Monstr'-inform'-ingens-horrend-ous
Demoniaco-seraphic
Penman's latest piece of graphic. Nay, my very wrist grows warm With his dragging weight of arm! E'en so, swimmingly appears, Thro' one's after-supper musings, Some lost Lady of old years, With her beauteous vain endeavour, And goodness unrepaid as ever; The face, accustomed to refusings, We, puppies that we were Surely, nice of conscience, scrupled Being aught like false, forsooth, to? Telling aught but honest truth to ? What a sin, had we centupled Its possessor's grace and sweetness! No she heard in its completeness Truth, for truth's a weighty matter, And, truth at issue, we can't flatter! Well, 'tis done with: she's exempt From damning us thro' such a sally; And so she glides, as down a valley, Taking up with her contempt, Past our reach; and in, the flowers Shut her unregarded hours.
Oh, could I have him back once more, This Waring, but one half-day more! Back, with the quiet face of yore, So hungry for acknowledgment
Like mine! I'd fool him to his bent !
Feed, should not he, to heart's content?
"Your great works, tho' they ne'er make progress, "Surpasses all we 've yet achieved!"
I'd lie so, I should be believed.
I'd make such havoc of the claims
Of the day's distinguished names
To feast him with, as feasts an ogress
Her sharp-toothed golden-crowned child! Or, as one feasts a creature rarely
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