POEMS WRITTEN IN 1822

LINES

I

WHEN the lamp is shattered,
The light in the dust lies dead;
When the cloud is scattered,
The rainbow's glory is shed;

When the lute is broken,
Sweet tones are remembered not;
When the lips have spoken,
Loved accents are soon forgot.

II

As music and splendor

Survive not the lamp and the lute,
The heart's echoes render

No song when the spirit is mute :
No song but sad dirges,
Like the wind through a ruined cell,
Or the mournful surges
That ring the dead seaman's knell.

III

When hearts have once mingled, Love first leaves the well-built nest;

Lines. Published by Mrs. Shelley, 1824.

i. 6 tones, Mrs. Shelley, 1824 || notes, Trelawny MS. ii. 6 through, Mrs. Shelley, 1824 || in, Trelawny MS.

8 dead, Mrs. Shelley, 1824 || lost, Trelawny MS.

The weak one is singled

To endure what it once possessed.
O Love! who bewailest

The frailty of all things here,

Why choose you the frailest

For your cradle, your home, and your bier?

IV

Its passions will rock thee,

As the storms rock the ravens on high;
Bright reason will mock thee,
Like the sun from a wintry sky.
From thy nest every rafter
Will rot, and thine eagle home

Leave thee naked to laughter,
When leaves fall and cold winds come.

THE MAGNETIC LADY TO HER PATIENT

66

I

SLEEP, sleep on! forget thy pain;
My hand is on thy brow,
My spirit on thy brain;

My pity on thy heart, poor friend;
And from my fingers flow

The powers of life, and like a sign,
Seal thee from thine hour of woe;

iii. 7 choose, Mrs. Shelley, 1824 || chose, Trelawny MS. iv. omit, Trelawny MS.

The Magnetic Lady to her Patient. Published by Medwin, Athenæum, August 11, 1832.

i. 1, ii. 1 Sleep, Trelawny MS., Mrs. Shelley, 18392 || Sleep on, Medwin.

66

And brood on thee, but may not blend
With thine.

II

Sleep, sleep on! I love thee not;
But when I think that he

Who made and makes my lot
As full of flowers, as thine of weeds,

Might have been lost like thee;
And that a hand which was not mine
Might then have charmed his agony
As I another's-my heart bleeds
For thine.

III

"Sleep, sleep, and with the slumber of
The dead and the unborn
Forget thy life and love;

Forget that thou must wake forever;
Forget the world's dull scorn;
Forget lost health, and the divine

Feelings which died in youth's brief morn;

And forget me, for I can never
Be thine.

IV

"Like a cloud big with a May shower,
My soul weeps healing rain
On thee, thou withered flower;
It breathes mute music on thy sleep;
Its odor calms thy brain!

Its light within thy gloomy breast

Spreads like a second youth again.

ii. 7 charmed, Trelawny MS. || chased, Medwin, 1832.

iii. 3 love, Trelawny, MS. Mrs. Shelley, 18392 || woe, Medwin,

1832.

iii. 7 which, Trelawny MS., Mrs. Shelley, 18392 || that, Medwin, 1832.

By mine thy being is to its deep
Possessed.

"The spell is done. How feel you now?" "Better-quite well," replied

The sleeper, "What would do

You good when suffering and awake?

"What cure your head and side?” What would cure, that would kill me, Jane;

And as I must on earth abide Awhile, yet tempt me not to break My chain."

TO JANE:

THE INVITATION

BEST and brightest, come away !
Fairer far than this fair Day,
Which, like thee to those in sorrow,
Comes to bid a sweet good-morrow
To the rough Year just awake
In its cradle on the brake.

The brightest hour of unborn Spring,
Through the winter wandering,

Found it seems the halcyon Morn,
To hoar February born.

v. 6 Trelawny MS. || 'Twould kill me what would cure my pain. Medwin, 1832, Mrs. Shelley, 18391,2.

To Jane. The Invitation: The Recollection. Rossetti | The Pine Forest of the Cascine near Pisa. Mrs. Shelley, 1824, 18391. The Invitation. The Recollection. Mrs. Shelley, 18392. Published by Mrs. Shelley in two versions, the first, 1824, reprinted in this edition under FRAGMENTS, the second, 18392.

Bending from Heaven, in azure mirth,
It kissed the forehead of the Earth,
And smiled upon the silent sea,
And bade the frozen streams be free,
And waked to music all their fountains,
And breathed upon the frozen mountains,
And like a prophetess of May
Strewed flowers upon the barren way,
Making the wintry world appear
Like one on whom thou smilest, dear.

Away, away, from men and towns,
To the wild wood and the downs ;
To the silent wilderness
Where the soul need not repress
Its music, lest it should not find
An echo in another's mind,
While the touch of Nature's art
Harmonizes heart to heart.

I leave this notice on my door
For each accustomed visitor:
"I am gone into the fields
To take what this sweet hour yields.
Reflection, you may come to-morrow,
Sit by the fireside with Sorrow.
You with the unpaid bill, Despair,
You, tiresome verse-reciter, Care,
I will pay you in the grave,—
Death will listen to your stave.
Expectation too, be off!
To-day is for itself enough.
Hope, in pity mock not Woe

34 with, Trelawny MS. || of, Mrs. Shelley, 18392.