PROSPICE. FEAR death?-to feel the fog in my throat, The mist in my face, When the snows begin, and the blasts denote The power of the night, the press of the storm, Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form, For the journey is done and the summit attained, Though a battle 's to fight ere the guerdon be gained, I was ever a fighter, so The best and the last! -one fight more, I would hate that death bandaged my eyes, and forbore, And bade me creep past. No! let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers The heroes of old, Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's arrears For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave, And the elements' rage, the fiend-voices that rave, Shall dwindle, shall blend, Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, "CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME." (See Edgar's song in "LEAR.") I. My first thought was, he lied in every word, II. What else should he be set for, with his staff? All travellers who might find him posted there, III. If at his counsel I should turn aside Into that ominous tract which, all agree, I did turn as he pointed: neither pride So much as gladness that some end might be. IV. For, what with my whole world-wide wandering, With that obstreperous joy success would bring,— V. As when a sick man very near to death Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end VI. While some discuss if near the other graves He may not shame such tender love and stay. VII. Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest, And all the doubt was now-should I be fit? VIII. So, quiet as despair, I turned from him, IX. For mark! no sooner was I fairly found Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, Than, pausing to throw backward a last view O'er the safe road, 't was gone; grey plain all round: Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound. I might go on; nought else remained to do. X. So, on I went. I think I never saw Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve: XI. No! penury, inertness and grimace, In some strange sort, were the land's portion. "See "Or shut your eyes," said Nature peevishly, "It nothing skills: I cannot help my case: "T is the Last Judgment's fire must cure this place, "Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free." XII. If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to baulk All hope of greenness ? 't is a brute must walk Pashing their life out, with a brute's intents. XIII. As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood. One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare, Stood stupefied, however he came there : Thrust out past service from the devil's stud! XIV. Alive? he might be dead for aught I know, He must be wicked to deserve such pain. XV. I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart. |