Page:Prometheus Bound, and other poems.djvu/38

32 And what is the land—make answer free—

Which I wander through, in my wrong and fear?—

Ah! ah! ah me!

The gad-fly stingeth to agony!

O Earth, keep off that phantasm pale

Of earth-born Argus!—ah!—I quail

When my soul descries

That herdsman with the myriad eyes—

Which seem, as he comes, one crafty eye!

Graves hide him not, though he should die,—

But he doggeth me in my misery

From the roots of death, on high—on high—

And along the sands of the siding deep,

All famine-worn, he follows me,

And his waxen reed doth undersound

The waters round,

And giveth a measure that giveth sleep.

Woe, woe, woe!

Where shall my weary course be done?—

What wouldst thou with me, Saturn's son?

And in what have I sinned, that I should go,

Thus yoked to grief by thine hand for ever?

Ah! ah! dost vex me so.

That I madden and shiver,

Stung through with dread?

Flash the fire down, to burn me!

Heave the earth up, to cover me!

Or plunge me in the deep, with the salt waves over me,

Where the sea-beasts may be fed!

And, O king, do not spurn me

In my prayer!

For this wandering, everlonger, evermore,