Page:Prometheus Unbound - Shelley.djvu/46

42 Oh! many fearful natures in one name, I know ye; and these lakes and echoes know The darkness and the clangour of your wings. But why more hideous than your loathed selves Gather ye up in legions from the deep?

We knew not that: Sisters, rejoice, rejoice!

Can aught exult in its deformity?

The beauty of delight makes lovers glad, Gazing on one another: so are we. As from the rose which the pale priestess kneels To gather for her festal crown of flowers The aerial crimson falls, flushing her cheek, So from our victim's destined agony The shade which is our form invests us round, Else we are shapeless as our mother Night.

I laugh your power, and his who sent you here, To lowest scorn. Pour forth the cup of pain.

Thou thinkest we will rend thee bone from bone, And nerve from nerve, working like fire within?

Pain is my element, as hate is thine; Ye rend me now: I care not.