No More Learning

'Look not so, Laon--say farewell in hope, _1180
These bloody men are but the slaves who bear
Their mistress to her task--it was my scope
The slavery where they drag me now, to share,
And among captives willing chains to wear
Awhile--the rest thou knowest--return, dear friend! _1185
Let our first triumph trample the despair
Which would ensnare us now, for in the end,
In victory or in death our hopes and fears must blend. '

10.
These words had fallen on my unheeding ear,
Whilst I had watched the motions of the crew _1190
With seeming-careless glance; not many were
Around her, for their comrades just withdrew
To guard some other victim--so I drew
My knife, and with one impulse, suddenly
All unaware three of their number slew, _1195
And grasped a fourth by the throat, and with loud cry
My countrymen invoked to death or liberty!

11.
What followed then, I know not--for a stroke
On my raised arm and naked head, came down,
Filling my eyes with blood. --When I awoke, _1200
I felt that they had bound me in my swoon,
And up a rock which overhangs the town,
By the steep path were bearing me; below,
The plain was filled with slaughter,--overthrown
The vineyards and the harvests, and the glow _1205
Of blazing roofs shone far o'er the white Ocean's flow.

12.
Upon that rock a mighty column stood,
Whose capital seemed sculptured in the sky,
Which to the wanderers o'er the solitude
Of distant seas, from ages long gone by, _1210
Had made a landmark; o'er its height to fly
Scarcely the cloud, the vulture, or the blast,
Has power--and when the shades of evening lie
On Earth and Ocean, its carved summits cast
The sunken daylight far through the aerial waste. _1215

13.
They bore me to a cavern in the hill
Beneath that column, and unbound me there;
And one did strip me stark; and one did fill
A vessel from the putrid pool; one bare
A lighted torch, and four with friendless care _1220
Guided my steps the cavern-paths along,
Then up a steep and dark and narrow stair
We wound, until the torch's fiery tongue
Amid the gushing day beamless and pallid hung.

14.
They raised me to the platform of the pile, _1225
That column's dizzy height:--the grate of brass
Through which they thrust me, open stood the while,
As to its ponderous and suspended mass,
With chains which eat into the flesh, alas!
With brazen links, my naked limbs they bound: _1230
The grate, as they departed to repass,
With horrid clangour fell, and the far sound
Of their retiring steps in the dense gloom was drowned.

15.
The noon was calm and bright:--around that column
The overhanging sky and circling sea _1235
Spread forth in silentness profound and solemn
The darkness of brief frenzy cast on me,
So that I knew not my own misery:
The islands and the mountains in the day
Like clouds reposed afar; and I could see _1240
The town among the woods below that lay,
And the dark rocks which bound the bright and glassy bay.

16.
It was so calm, that scarce the feathery weed
Sown by some eagle on the topmost stone
Swayed in the air:--so bright, that noon did breed _1245
No shadow in the sky beside mine own--
Mine, and the shadow of my chain alone.
Below, the smoke of roofs involved in flame
Rested like night, all else was clearly shown
In that broad glare; yet sound to me none came, _1250
But of the living blood that ran within my frame.

17.
The peace of madness fled, and ah, too soon!
A ship was lying on the sunny main,
Its sails were flagging in the breathless noon--
Its shadow lay beyond--that sight again _1255
Waked, with its presence, in my tranced brain
The stings of a known sorrow, keen and cold:
I knew that ship bore Cythna o'er the plain
Of waters, to her blighting slavery sold,
And watched it with such thoughts as must remain untold. _1260

18.
I watched until the shades of evening wrapped
Earth like an exhalation--then the bark
Moved, for that calm was by the sunset snapped.
It moved a speck upon the Ocean dark:
Soon the wan stars came forth, and I could mark _1265
Its path no more! --I sought to close mine eyes,
But like the balls, their lids were stiff and stark;
I would have risen, but ere that I could rise,
My parched skin was split with piercing agonies.

19.
I gnawed my brazen chain, and sought to sever _1270
Its adamantine links, that I might die:
O Liberty! forgive the base endeavour,
Forgive me, if, reserved for victory,
The Champion of thy faith e'er sought to fly. --
That starry night, with its clear silence, sent _1275
Tameless resolve which laughed at misery
Into my soul--linked remembrance lent
To that such power, to me such a severe content.

20.