Page:Keats - Poetical Works, DeWolfe, 1884.djvu/312

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Of triumph calm, and hymns of festival,] From the gold peaks of heaven's high piled clouds; [Voices of soft proclaim, and silver stir Of strings in hollow shells; and there shall be Beautiful things made new for the surprise Of the sky-children."] So he feebly ceased, With such a poor and sickly-sounding pause, Methought I hear some old man of the earth Bewailing earthly loss; nor could my eyes And ears act with that unison of sense Which marries sweet sound with the grace of form, And dolorous accent from a tragic harp With large limb'd visions. More I scrutinized. Still fixt he sat beneath the sable trees, Whose arms spread straggling in wild serpent forms. With leaves all hush'd; his awful presence there (Now all was silent) gave a deadly lie To what I erewhile heard: only his lips Trembled amid the white curls of his beard; They told the truth, though round the snowy locks Hung nobly, as upon the face of heaven A mid-day fleece of clouds. Thea arose, And stretcht her white arm through the hollow dark, Pointing some whither: whereat he too rose, Like a vast giant seen by men at sea To grow pale from the waves at dull midnight They melted from my sight into the woods; Ere I could turn, Moneta cried, "These twain Are speeding to the families of grief, Where, rooft in by black rocks, they waste [wait?] in pain