John Keats - Selected Poems and Letters

I love a youth of Corinth – O the bliss!

Give me my woman’s form, and place me where he is.

Stoop, Hermes, let me breathe upon thy brow,

And thou shalt see thy sweet nymph even now.”

The God on half-shut feathers sank serene,

She breath’d upon his eyes, and swift was seen

Of both the guarded nymph near-smiling on the green.

It was no dream; or say a dream it was,

Real are the dreams of Gods, and smoothly pass

Their pleasures in a long immortal dream.

One warm, flush’d moment, hovering, it might seem

Dash’d by the wood-nymph’s beauty, so he burn’d;

Then, lighting on the printless verdure, turn’d

To the swoon’d serpent, and with languid arm,

Delicate, put to proof the lythe Caducean charm.

So done, upon the nymph his eyes he bent

Full of adoring tears and blandishment,

And towards her stept: she, like a moon in wane,

Faded before him, cower’d, nor could restrain

Her fearful sobs, self-folding like a flower

That faints into itself at evening hour:

But the God fostering her chilled hand,

She felt the warmth, her eyelids open’d bland,

And, like new flowers at morning song of bees,

Bloom’d, and gave up her honey to the lees.

Into the green-recessed woods they flew;

Nor grew they pale, as mortal lovers do.

Left to herself, the serpent now began

To change; her elfin blood in madness ran,

Her mouth foam’d, and the grass, therewith besprent,

Wither’d at dew so sweet and virulent;

Her eyes in torture fix’d, and anguish drear,

Hot, glaz’d, and wide, with lid-lashes all sear,

Flash’d phosphor and sharp sparks, without one cooling tear.

The colours all inflam’d throughout her train,

She writh’d about, convuls’d with scarlet pain:

A deep volcanian yellow took the place

Of all her milder-mooned body’s grace;

And, as the lava ravishes the mead,

Spoilt all her silver mail, and golden brede;

Made gloom of all her frecklings, streaks and bars,

Eclips’d her crescents, and lick’d up her stars:

So that, in moments few, she was undrest

Of all her sapphires, greens, and amethyst,

And rubious-argent: of all these bereft,

Nothing but pain and ugliness were left.

Still shone her crown; that vanish’d, also she

Melted and disappear’d as suddenly;

And in the air, her new voice luting soft,

Cried, “Lycius! gentle Lycius!” – Borne aloft

With the bright mists about the mountains hoar

These words dissolv’d: Crete’s forests heard no more.

Whither fled Lamia, now a lady bright,

A full-born beauty new and exquisite?

She fled into that valley they pass o’er

Who go to Corinth from Cenchreas’ shore;

And rested at the foot of those wild hills,

The rugged founts of the Peræan rills,

And of that other ridge whose barren back

Stretches, with all its mist and cloudy rack,

South-westward to Cleone. There she stood

About a young bird’s flutter from a wood,

Fair, on a sloping green of mossy tread,

By a clear pool, wherein she passioned

To see herself escap’d from so sore ills,

While her robes flaunted with the daffodils.

Ah, happy Lycius! – for she was a maid

More beautiful than ever twisted braid,

Or sigh’d, or blush’d, or on spring-flowered lea

Spread a green kirtle to the minstrelsy:

A virgin purest lipp’d, yet in the lore

Of love deep learned to the red heart’s core:

Not one hour old, yet of sciential brain

To unperplex bliss from its neighbour pain;

Define their pettish limits, and estrange

Their points of contact, and swift counterchange;

Intrigue with the specious chaos, and dispart

Its most ambiguous atoms with sure art;

As though in Cupid’s college she had spent

Sweet days a lovely graduate, still unshent,

And kept his rosy terms in idle languishment.

Why this fair creature chose so fairily

By the wayside to linger, we shall see;

But first ’tis fit to tell how she could muse

And dream, when in the serpent prison-house,

Of all she list, strange or magnificent:

How, ever, where she will’d, her spirit went;

Whether to faint Elysium, or where

Down through tress-lifting waves the Nereids fair

Wind into Thetis’ bower by many a pearly stair;

Or where God Bacchus drains his cups divine,

Stretch’d out, at ease, beneath a glutinous pine;

Or where in Pluto’s gardens palatine

Mulciber’s columns gleam in far piazzian line.

And sometimes into cities she would send

Her dream, with feast and rioting to blend;

And once, while among mortals dreaming thus,

She saw the young Corinthian Lycius

Charioting foremost in the envious race,

Like a young Jove with calm uneager face,

And fell into a swooning love of him.

Now on the moth-time of that evening dim

He would return that way, as well she knew,

To Corinth from the shore; for freshly blew

The eastern soft wind, and his galley now

Grated the quaystones with her brazen prow

In port Cenchreas, from Egina isle

Fresh anchor’d; whither he had been awhile

To sacrifice to Jove, whose temple there

Waits with high marble doors for blood and incense rare.

Jove heard his vows, and better’d his desire;

For by some freakful chance he made retire

From his companions, and set forth to walk,

Perhaps grown wearied of their Corinth talk:

Over the solitary hills he fared,

Thoughtless at first, but ere eve’s star appeared

His phantasy was lost, where reason fades,

In the calm’d twilight of Platonic shades.

Lamia beheld him coming, near, more near –

Close to her passing, in indifference drear,

His silent sandals swept the mossy green;

So neighbour’d to him, and yet so unseen

She stood: he pass’d, shut up in mysteries,

His mind wrapp’d like his mantle, while her eyes

Follow’d his steps, and her neck regal white

Turn’d – syllabling thus, “Ah, Lycius bright,

And will you leave me on the hills alone?

Lycius, look back! and be some pity shown.”

He did; not with cold wonder fearingly,

But Orpheus-like at an Eurydice;

For so delicious were the words she sung,

It seem’d he had lov’d them a whole summer long:

And soon his eyes had drunk her beauty up,

Leaving no drop in the bewildering cup,

And still the cup was full, – while he, afraid

Lest she should vanish ere his lip had paid

Due adoration, thus began to adore;

Her soft look growing coy, she saw his chain so sure:

“Leave thee alone! Look back! Ah, Goddess, see

Whether my eyes can ever turn from thee!

For pity do not this sad heart belie –

Even as thou vanishest so I shall die.

Stay! though a Naiad of the rivers, stay!

To thy far wishes will thy streams obey:

Stay! though the greenest woods be thy domain,

Alone they can drink up the morning rain:

Though a descended Pleiad, will not one

Of thine harmonious sisters keep in tune

Thy spheres, and as thy silver proxy shine?

So sweetly to these ravish’d ears of mine

Came thy sweet greeting, that if thou shouldst fade

Thy memory will waste me to a shade: –

For pity do not melt!” – “If I should stay,”

Said Lamia, “here, upon this floor of clay,

And pain my steps upon these flowers too rough,

What canst thou say or do of charm enough

To dull the nice remembrance of my home?

Thou canst not ask me with thee here to roam

Over these hills and vales, where no joy is, –