Page:Prometheus Unbound - Shelley.djvu/57

SCENE I. From unremembered ages we Gentle guides and guardians be Of heaven-oppressed mortality; And we breathe, and sicken not, The atmosphere of human thought: Be it dim, and dank, and grey, Like a storm-extinguished day, Travelled o'er by dying gleams; Be it bright as all between Cloudless skies and windless streams, Silent, liquid, and serene; As the birds within the wind, As the fish within the wave, As the thoughts of man's own mind Float thro' all above the grave; We make there our liquid lair, Voyaging cloudlike and unpent Thro' the boundless element: Thence we bear the prophecy Which begins and ends in thee!

More yet come, one by one: the air around them Looks radiant as the air around a star.