Page:Prometheus Bound, and other poems.djvu/27

Rh

And I spring with a rapid foot away

From the rushing car, and the holy air

The track of birds—

And I drop to the rugged ground, and, there,

Await the tale of thy despair.

Oceanus. I reach the bourne of my weary road,

Where I could see and answer thee,

Prometheus, in thine agony!

On the back of the quick-winged bird I glode,

And I bridled him in

With the will of a god,—

And know, thy sorrow aches in me,

Constrained by the force of kin.

Nay, though that tie were all undone,

For the life of none beneath the sun,

Would I seek a larger benison,

Than I seek for thine!—

And thou shalt learn my words are truth,—

That no fair parlance of the mouth

Grows falsely out of mine!

Then give me a deed to prove my faith,—

For no faster friend is named in breath,

Than I, Oceanus, am thine.

Prometheus. Ha! what has brought thee? Hast thou also come

To look upon my woe? How hast thou dared

To leave the depths called after thee, the caves

Self-hewn and self-roofed with spontaneous rock,

To visit Earth, the mother of my chain?

Hast come indeed to view my doom, and mourn

That I should sorrow thus? Gaze on, and see