Page:Prometheus Unbound - Shelley.djvu/45

SCENE I. See where the child of Heaven, with winged feet, Runs down the slanted sunlight of the dawn.

Dear sister, close thy plumes over thine eyes Lest thou behold and die: they come: they come Blackening the birth of day with countless wings, And hollow underneath, like death.

Prometheus!

Immortal Titan!

Champion of Heaven's slaves!

He whom some dreadful voice invokes is here, Prometheus, the chained Titan. Horrible forms, What and who are ye? Never yet there came Phantasms so foul thro' monster-teeming Hell From the all-miscreative brain of Jove; Whilst I behold such execrable shapes, Methinks I grow like what I contemplate, And laugh and stare in loathsome sympathy.

We are the ministers of pain, and fear, And disappointment, and mistrust, and hate, And clinging crime; and as lean dogs pursue Thro' wood and lake some struck and sobbing fawn, We track all things that weep, and bleed, and live, When the great King betrays them to our will.