LINES WRITTEN FOR THE INDIAN
SERENADE

O PILLOW cold and wet with tears!
Thou breathest sleep no more!

LINES WRITTEN FOR THE ODE TO LIBERTY

WITHIN a cavern of man's trackless spirit

Is throned an Image, so intensely fair That the adventurous thoughts that wander near it Worship, and as they kneel tremble and wear The splendor of its presence, and the light

Penetrates their dreamlike frame

Till they become charged with the strength of flame.

STANZA WRITTEN FOR THE ODE WRITTEN OCTOBER, 1819

GATHER, oh, gather,

Foeman and friend in love and peace!

Waves sleep together

When the blasts that called them to battle cease. For fangless Power, grown tame and mild,

Is at play with Freedom's fearless child —
The dove and the serpent reconciled!

Lines written for the Indian Serenade. Published by Rossetti, 1870.

Lines written for the Ode to Liberty. Published by Garnett, 1862. Stanza written for the Ode written October, 1819. Published in The Times (Rossetti).

LINES CONNECTED WITH EPIPSYCHIDION

HERE, my dear friend, is a new book for you;
I have already dedicated two

To other friends, one female and one male,-
What you are is a thing that I must veil;
What can this be to those who praise or rail?
I never was attached to that great sect
Whose doctrine is that each one should select
Out of the world a mistress or a friend,
And all the rest, though fair and wise, commend
To cold oblivion - though 'tis in the code
Of modern morals, and the beaten road
Which those poor slaves with weary footsteps tread
Who travel to their home among the dead
By the broad highway of the world and so
With one sad friend, and many a jealous foe,
The dreariest and the longest journey go.

Free love has this, different from gold and clay, That to divide is not to take away.

Like ocean, which the general north wind breaks
Into ten thousand waves, and each one makes
A mirror of the moon like some great glass,
Which did distort whatever form might pass,
Dashed into fragments by a playful child,
Which then reflects its eyes and forehead mild;
Giving for one, which it could ne'er express,

A thousand images of loveliness.

Lines connected with Epipsychidion. Published, 1–37, 62–91, by Mrs. Shelley, 18392, 1-174, by Garnett (To His Genius. Miscellaneous Fragments), 1862.

If I were one whom the loud world held wise, I should disdain to quote authorities In commendation of this kind of love. Why there is first the God in heaven above, Who wrote a book called Nature 'tis to be Reviewed, I hear, in the next Quarterly; And Socrates, the Jesus Christ of Greece, And Jesus Christ himself did never cease To urge all living things to love each other, And to forgive their mutual faults, and smother The Devil of disunion in their souls.

I love you! - Listen, O embodied Ray Of the great Brightness; I must pass away While you remain, and these light words must be Tokens by which you may remember me.

Start not the thing you are is unbetrayed,

If you are human, and if but the shade

Of some sublimer Spirit.

And as to friend or mistress, 'tis a form;

Perhaps I wish you were one.

Some declare

You a familiar spirit, as you are;

Others with a

more inhuman

Hint that, though not my wife, you are a woman What is the color of your eyes and hair?

Why, if you were a lady, it were fair

The world should know but, as I am afraid,
The Quarterly would bait you if betrayed;
And if, as it will be sport to see them stumble
Over all sorts of scandals, hear them mumble

29 commendation, Garnett, 1862 || the support, Mrs. Shelley, 18392. 54 if, omit, Rossetti.

Their litany of curses some guess right,
And others swear you 're a Hermaphrodite;
Like that sweet marble monster of both sexes,
With looks so sweet and gentle that it vexes
The very soul that the soul is gone

Which lifted from her limbs the veil of stone.

It is a sweet thing, friendship, a dear balm, A happy and auspicious bird of calm, Which rides o'er life's ever tumultuous Ocean; A God that broods o'er chaos in commotion; A flower which fresh as Lapland roses are, Lifts its bold head into the world's frore air, And blooms most radiantly when others die, Health, hope, and youth, and brief prosperity; And with the light and odor of its bloom, Shining within the dungeon and the tomb; Whose coming is as light and music are 'Mid dissonance and gloom - a star

Which moves not 'mid the moving heavens aloneA smile among dark frowns-a gentle tone Among rude voices, a beloved light,

A solitude, a refuge, a delight.

If I had but a friend! Why, I have three
Even by my own confession; there may be
Some more, for what I know, for 'tis my mind
To call my friends all who are wise and kind,
And these, Heaven knows, at best are very few;
But none can ever be more dear than you.
Why should they be? My muse has lost her wings,
Or like a dying swan who soars and sings,

67 frore, Rossetti || pure, Mrs. Shelley, 18392.

I should describe you in heroic style,
But as it is, are you not void of guile?

A lovely soul, formed to be blessed and bless;
A well of sealed and secret happiness;

A lute which those whom Love has taught to play Make music on to cheer the roughest day,

And enchant sadness till it sleeps?

To the oblivion whither I and thou,
All loving and all lovely, hasten now
With steps, ah, too unequal! may we meet
In one Elysium or one winding sheet!
If any should be curious to discover
Whether to you I am a friend or lover,
Let them read Shakespeare's sonnets, taking thence
A whetstone for their dull intelligence
That tears and will not cut, or let them guess
How Diotima, the wise prophetess,
Instructed the instructor, and why he
Rebuked the infant spirit of melody

On Agathon's sweet lips, which as he spoke
Was as the lovely star when morn has broke
The roof of darkness, in the golden dawn,
Half-hidden, and yet beautiful.

I'll pawn

My hopes of Heaven - you know what they are

That the presumptuous pedagogues of Earth,

If they could tell the riddle offered here
Would scorn to be, or, being, to appear

What now they seem and are - but let them chide,

They have few pleasures in the world beside;