Moan, brethren, moan; for lo, the rebel spheres
Spin round; the stars their ancient courses keep;
Clouds still with shadowy moisture haunt the earth,
Still suck their fill of light from sun and moon;
Still buds the tree, and still the sea shores murmur;
There is no death in all the universe,
No smell of death.—There shall be death. Moan moan;
Moan, Cybele, moan; for thy pernicious babes
Have changed a god into an aching palsy.
Moan, brethren, moan, for I have no strength left;
Weak as the reed, weak, feeble as my voice.
Oh! Oh! the pain, the pain of feebleness;
Moan, moan, for still I thaw; or give me help;
Throw down those imps, and give me victory.
Let me hear other groans, [and trumpets blown
And that fair kneeling goddess; and then spoke
As with a palsied tongue; and while his beard
Shook horrid with such aspen-malady.
"O tender Spouse of gold Hyperion,
Thea! I feel thee ere I see thy face!
Look up, and let me see our doom in it;
Look up, and tell me if this feeble shape
Is Saturn's; tell me if thou hear'st the voice
Of Saturn; tell me if this wrinkling brow,
Naked and bare of its great diadem,
Peers like the front of Saturn. Who had power
To make me desolate? whence came the strength?
How was it nurtured to such bursting-forth,
While Fate seem'd strangled in my nervous grasp?
But it is so; and I am smother' d up
And buried from all godlike exercise
Of influence benign on planets pale,
Of admonitions to the winds and seas,
Of peaceful sway above men's harvesting,
And all the acts which Deity supreme
Doth ease its heart of love in."
