Page:Prometheus bound - Browning (1833).djvu/117

There is an answer to all questioning,
That one word—death. Our bitterness can throw
No look upon the face of death, and live.
The burning thoughts that erst my soul illumed,
Were quench'd at once; as tapers in a pit
Wherein the vapour-witches weirdly reign
In charge of darkness. Farewell all the past!
It was out-blotted from my memory's eyes,
When clay's cold silence pleaded for its sin.

Farewell the elemental war! farewell
The clashing of the shielded clouds—the cry
Of scathed echoes! I no longer knew
Silence from sound, but wander'd far away
Into the deep Eleusis of mine heart,
To learn its secret things. When armëd foes
Meet on one deck with impulse violent,
The vessel quakes thro' all her oaken ribs,
And shivers in the sea; so with mine heart: