39.
I smiled, and spake not.—‘Wherefore dost thou smile
At what I say? Laon, I am not weak, _1010
And, though my cheek might become pale the while,
With thee, if thou desirest, will I seek
Through their array of banded slaves to wreak
Ruin upon the tyrants. I had thought
It was more hard to turn my unpractised cheek _1015
To scorn and shame, and this beloved spot
And thee, O dearest friend, to leave and murmur not.
40.
‘Whence came I what I am? Thou, Laon, knowest
How a young child should thus undaunted be;
Methinks, it is a power which thou bestowest, _1020
Through which I seek, by most resembling thee,
So to become most good and great and free;
Yet far beyond this Ocean’s utmost roar,
In towers and huts are many like to me,
Who, could they see thine eyes, or feel such lore _1025
As I have learnt from them, like me would fear no more.
41.
‘Think’st thou that I shall speak unskilfully,
And none will heed me? I remember now,
How once, a slave in tortures doomed to die,
Was saved, because in accents sweet and low _1030
He sung a song his Judge loved long ago,
As he was led to death.—All shall relent
Who hear me—tears, as mine have flowed, shall flow,
Hearts beat as mine now beats, with such intent
As renovates the world; a will omnipotent! _1035
42.
‘Yes, I will tread Pride’s golden palaces,
Through Penury’s roofless huts and squalid cells
Will I descend, where’er in abjectness
Woman with some vile slave her tyrant dwells,
There with the music of thine own sweet spells _1040
Will disenchant the captives, and will pour
For the despairing, from the crystal wells
Of thy deep spirit, reason’s mighty lore,
And power shall then abound, and hope arise once more.
43.
‘Can man be free if woman be a slave? _1045
Chain one who lives, and breathes this boundless air,
To the corruption of a closed grave!
Can they whose mates are beasts, condemned to bear
Scorn, heavier far than toil or anguish, dare
To trample their oppressors? in their home _1050
Among their babes, thou knowest a curse would wear
The shape of woman—hoary Crime would come
Behind, and Fraud rebuild religion’s tottering dome.
44.
‘I am a child:—I would not yet depart.
When I go forth alone, bearing the lamp _1055
Aloft which thou hast kindled in my heart,
Millions of slaves from many a dungeon damp
Shall leap in joy, as the benumbing cramp
Of ages leaves their limbs—no ill may harm
Thy Cythna ever—truth its radiant stamp _1060
Has fixed, as an invulnerable charm,
Upon her children’s brow, dark Falsehood to disarm.
45.
‘Wait yet awhile for the appointed day—
Thou wilt depart, and I with tears shall stand
Watching thy dim sail skirt the ocean gray; _1065
Amid the dwellers of this lonely land
I shall remain alone—and thy command
Shall then dissolve the world’s unquiet trance,
And, multitudinous as the desert sand
Borne on the storm, its millions shall advance, _1070
Thronging round thee, the light of their deliverance.
46.
‘Then, like the forests of some pathless mountain,
Which from remotest glens two warring winds
Involve in fire which not the loosened fountain
Of broadest floods might quench, shall all the kinds _1075
Of evil, catch from our uniting minds
The spark which must consume them;—Cythna then
Will have cast off the impotence that binds
Her childhood now, and through the paths of men
Will pass, as the charmed bird that haunts the serpent’s den. _1080
47.
‘We part!—O Laon, I must dare nor tremble,
To meet those looks no more!—Oh, heavy stroke!
Sweet brother of my soul! can I dissemble
The agony of this thought?’—As thus she spoke
The gathered sobs her quivering accents broke, _1085
And in my arms she hid her beating breast.
I remained still for tears—sudden she woke
As one awakes from sleep, and wildly pressed
My bosom, her whole frame impetuously possessed.
48.
‘We part to meet again—but yon blue waste, _1090
Yon desert wide and deep, holds no recess,
Within whose happy silence, thus embraced
We might survive all ills in one caress:
Nor doth the grave—I fear ’tis passionless—
Nor yon cold vacant Heaven:—we meet again _1095
Within the minds of men, whose lips shall bless
Our memory, and whose hopes its light retain
When these dissevered bones are trodden in the plain.’