Though watchful, 'twas not to defame me, V. Yet I blame not the world, nor despise it, And if dearly that error hath cost me, VI. From the wreck of the past, which hath perish'd, It hath taught me that what I most cherish'd In the desert a fountain is springing, In the wide waste there still is a tree, And a bird in the solitude singing, DARKNESS. I HAD a dream, which was not all a dream. The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air; Morn came, and went-and came, and brought no day, And men forgot their passions in the dread Of this their desolation; and all hearts Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light: And they did live by watchfires-and the thrones, The palaces of crowned kings-the huts, The habitations of all things which dwell, Were burnt for beacons; cities were consumed, And men were gathered round their blazing homes eye Of the volcanos, and their mountain-torch : The flashes fell upon them; some lay down And hid their eyes and wept; and some did rest Their funeral piles with fuel, and looked up With mad disquietude on the dull sky, The pall of a past world; and then again With curses cast them down upon the dust, And gnash'd their teeth and howl'd: the wild birds. shriek'd, And, terrified, did flutter on the ground, And flap their useless wings; the wildest brutes Came tame and tremulous; and vipers crawl'd Of famine fed upon all entrails-men Died, and their bones were tombless as their flesh; And a quick desolate cry, licking the hand And they were enemies; they met beside The dying embers of an altar-place Where had been heap'd a mass of holy things For an unholy usage; they raked up, And shivering scraped with their cold skeleton hands The feeble ashes, and their feeble breath Blew for a little life, and made a flame Which was a mockery; then they lifted up Each other's aspects-saw, and shriek'd, and died- Unknowing who he was upon whose brow Famine had written Fiend. The world was void, And nothing stirred within their silent depths; Ships sailorless lay rotting on the sea, And their masts fell down piecemeal; as they dropp'd They slept on the abyss without a surge— The waves were dead; the tides were in their grave, |