KUBLA KHAN. 27 KUBLA KHAN: A FRAGMENT. IN Xanadu did Kubla Khan So twice five miles of fertile ground But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman wailing for her demon-lover! And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, 28 KUBLA KHAN. Then reached the caverns measureless to man, And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean: And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far The shadow of the dome of pleasure Where was heard the mingled measure A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice! In a vision once I saw: It was an Abyssinian maid, And on her dulcimer she played, Could I revive within me Her symphony and song, To such a deep delight 'twould win me That with music loud and long, I would build that dome in air, That sunny dome! those caves of ice! And all who heard should see them there, Samuel Taylor Coleridge. THE ISLES OF GREECE. 29 THE ISLES OF GREECE. THE isles of Greece, the isles of Greece! Eternal summer gilds them yet, The Scian and the Teian muse, To sounds which echo further west The mountains look on Marathon- I dreamed that Greece might still be free; For standing on the Persians' grave, A king sat on the rocky brow Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis; And men in nations;-all were his! 30 THE ISLES OF GREECE. And where are they? and where art thou, The heroic bosom beats no more! 'Tis something, in the dearth of fame, Even as I sing, suffuse my face; Must we but weep o'er days more blest? What, silent still? and silent all? And answer, "Let one living head, In vain-in vain; strike other chords; And shed the blood of Scio's vine! THE ISLES OF GREECE. You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet— The nobler and the manlier one? Fill high the bowl with Samian wine! It made Anacreon's song divine: He served-but served Polycrates A tyrant; but our masters then Were still, at least, our countrymen. The tyrant of the Chersonese Was freedom's best and bravest friend; That tyrant was Miltiades! Oh! that the present hour would lend Another despot of the kind! Such chains as his were sure to bind. Fill high the bowl with Samian wine! Such as the Doric mothers bore; Trust not for freedom to the Franks- 31 |