XII Sudden, from out that city sprung A light that made the earth grow red; Two flames that each with quivering tongue Licked its high domes, and overhead XIII And hark! a rush as if the deep Had burst its bonds; she looked behind And saw over the western steep A raging flood descend, and wind Through that wide vale; she felt no fear, But said within herself, "Tis clear XVII At last her plank an eddy crost, And bore her to the city's wall, XVIII The eddy whirled her round and round Its aëry arch with light like blood; XIX These towers are Nature's own, and she For it was filled with sculptures rarest, To save them has sent forth the sea. XIV And now those raging billows came Where that fair Lady sate, and she And on a little plank, the flow XV The flames were fiercely vomited From every tower and every dome, And dreary light did widely shed Of forms most beautiful and strange, Like nothing human, but the fairest Of winged shapes, whose legions range Throughout the sleep of those that are, Like this same Lady, good and fair. XX And as she looked, still lovelier grew sure Was a strong spirit, and the hue Of his own mind did there endure After the touch, whose power had braided O'er that vast flood's suspended foam, Such grace, was in some sad change Beneath the smoke which hung its night Grew tranquil as a woodland river Winding through hills in solitude; Those marble shapes then seemed to quiver, Of the drowning mountains, in and And their fair limbs to float in motion, As the thistle-beard on a whirlwind out, sails Like weeds unfolding in the ocean. XXII While the flood was filling those hollow And their lips moved; one seemed to Waked the fair Lady from her sleep, The blood and life within those snowy Flows on, and fills all things with melody. Now is thy voice a tempest swift and strong, Alas, that the torn heart can bleed, On which, like one in trance upborne, but not forget! II A breathless awe, like the swift change Unseen, but felt in youthful slumbers, Wild, sweet, but uncommunicably strange, Thou breathest now in fast ascending numbers. The cope of heaven seems rent and cloven By the enchantment of thy strain, And on my shoulders wings are woven, To follow its sublime career, Beyond the mighty moons that wane Secure o'er rocks and waves I sweep, Rejoicing like a cloud of morn. Now 'tis the breath of summer night, Which when the starry waters sleep, Round western isles, with incenseblossoms bright, Lingering, suspends my soul in its voluptuous flight. TO CONSTANTIA I THE rose that drinks the fountain dew In the pleasant air of noon, |