III. If whatever face thou paintest In those eyes grows pale with pleasure, If the fainting soul is faintest When it hears thy harp's wild measure, Wonder not that, when thou speakest, Of the weak my heart is weakest. IV. As dew beneath the wind of morning, Is my ON THE MEDUSA OF LEONARDO DA VINCI, IN THE FLORENTINE GALLERY. I. Ir lieth, gazing on the midnight sky, Its horror and its beauty are divine. II. Yet it is less the horror than the grace Which turns the gazer's spirit into stone; Are graven, till the characters be grown 'Tis the melodious hue of beauty thrown III. And from its head as from one body grow, As Hairs which are vipers, and they curl and flow Their mailed radiance, as it were to mock IV. And from a stone beside, a poisonous eft Of sense, has flitted with a mad surprise And he comes hastening like a moth that hies After a taper; and the midnight sky Flares, a light more dread than obscurity. V. 'Tis the tempestuous loveliness of terror; For from the serpents gleams a brazen glare Kindled by that inextricable error, Which makes a thrilling vapour of the air Become a and ever-shifting mirror Of all the beauty and the terror there — A woman's countenance, with serpent locks, Gazing in death on heaven from those wet rocks. TO WILLIAM SHELLEY. (With what truth I may say - I. My lost William, thou in whom Like thee can die, thy funeral shrine II. Where art thou, my gentle child? The love of living leaves and weeds, Among these tombs and ruins wild ; Let me think that through low seeds Of the sweet flowers and sunny grass, Into their hues and scents may pass A portion THE SENSITIVE PLANT. PART FIRST. A SENSITIVE Plant in a garden grew, And the Spring arose on the garden fair, But none ever trembled and panted with bliss Like a doe in the noon-tide with love's sweet want, The snow-drop, and then the violet, Arose from the ground with warm rain wet, And their breath was mixed with fresh odour, sent From the turf, like the voice and the instrument. |