Poetical Works

O golden hair that like a miser's treas- | And by my cunning arguments persuade

ure

In its abundance overflows the measure! O graceful form, that cloudlike floatest

With the soft, undulating gait of one Who moveth as if motion were a pleas

ure!

By what name shall I call thee? Nymph or Muse,

Callirrhoë or Urania? Some sweet

name

Whose every syllable is a caress Would best befit thee; but I cannot choose,

Nor do I care to choose; for still the same,

Nameless or named, will be thy loveliness.

him

To marry her. What mischief lies concealed

In this design I know not; but I know Who thinks of marrying hath already taken

One step upon the road to penitence. Such embassies delight me. Forth I launch

On the sustaining air, nor fear to fall Like Icarus, nor swerve aside like him Who drove amiss Hyperion's fiery steeds. I sink, I fly! The yielding element Folds itself round about me like an arm, And holds me as a mother holds her child.

III.

Are my companions; my designs and labors

And aspirations are my only friends.

HERMES.

Decide not rashly. The decision made Can never be recalled. The Gods implore not,

Plead not, solicit not; they only offer Choice and occasion, which once being passed

Return no more. Dost thou accept the gift?

PROMETHEUS.

No gift of theirs, in whatsoever shape
It comes to me, with whatsoever charm
To fascinate my sense,
will I receive.
Leave me.

PANDORA.

This new toy and fascination,
This new dalliance and delight!
To the garden where reposes
Epimetheus crowned with roses,
To the door that never closes
Upon pleasure and temptation,
Bring this vision of the night!

IV.

THE AIR.

HERMES, returning to Olympus.

As lonely as the tower that he inhabits, As firm and cold as are the crags about him,

Prometheus stands. The thunderbolts of Zeus

Let us go hence. I will not stay. Alone can move him; but the tender

HERMES.

We leave thee to thy vacant dreams, and
all

The silence and the solitude of thought,
The endless bitterness of unbelief,
The loneliness of existence without love.

CHORUS OF THE FATES.

CLOTHO.

How the Titan, the defiant,
The self-centred, self-reliant,
Wrapped in visions and illusions,
Robs himself of life's best gifts!
Till by all the storm-winds shaken,
By the blast of fate o'ertaken,
Hopeless, helpless, and forsaken,
In the mists of his confusions
To the reefs of doom he drifts!

LACHESIS.

Sorely tried and sorely tempted,
From no agonies exempted,
In the penance of his trial,
And the discipline of pain;
Often by illusions cheated,
Often baffled and defeated
In the tasks to be completed,
He, by toil and self-denial,
To the highest shall attain.

ATROPOS.

Tempt no more the noble schemer;
Bear unto some idle dreamer

heart

They do but answer to the love in thine,

Yet secretly I wonder thou shouldst Lifted the lid?

love me.

Thou knowest me not.

EPIMETHEUS.

"T is a mystery.

PANDORA.

Hast thou never

EPIMETHEUS.

The oracle forbids.

Safely concealed there from all mortal

eyes Perhaps I know thee better Than had I known thee longer. Yet it

Forever sleeps the secret of the Gods. Seek not to know what they have hidden from thee,

Till they themselves reveal it.

PANDORA.

Thou dost not need a teacher.

They go out.

CHORUS OF THE EUMENIDES.

What the Immortals
Confide to thy keeping,
Tell unto no man ;
Waking or sleeping,
Closed be thy portals
To friend as to foeman.

Silence conceals it;
The word that is spoken
Betrays and reveals it;
By breath or by token
The charm may be broken.

With shafts of their splendors
The Gods unforgiving
Pursue the offenders,
The dead and the living!
Fortune forsakes them,
Nor earth shall abide them,
Nor Tartarus hide them;
Swift wrath overtakes them!

With useless endeavor,
Forever, forever,
Is Sisyphus rolling

His stone up the mountain!
Immersed in the fountain,
Tantalus tastes not
The water that wastes not!
Through ages increasing
The pangs that afflict him,
With motion unceasing
The wheel of Ixion
Shall torture its victim!

VI.

IN THE GARDEN.

EPIMETHEUS.

YON Snow-white cloud that sails sublime

in ether

EPIMETHEUS.

Whence knowest thou these stories?

PANDORA.

Hermes taught me ;

Is but the sovereign Zeus, who like a He told me all the history of the Gods.

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