The Complete Works: Poetry, Plays, Letters and Extensive Biographies - John Keats

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all his sorrowing? He sees her not.

      But who so stares on him? His sister sure!

      Peona of the woods!–Can she endure–

      Impossible–how dearly they embrace! His lady smiles; delight is in her face;

      It is no treachery.

      “Dear brother mine!

      Endymion, weep not so! Why shouldst thou pine

      When all great Latmos so exalt will be?

      Thank the great gods, and look not bitterly;

      And speak not one pale word, and sigh no more.

      Sure I will not believe thou hast such store

      Of grief, to last thee to my kiss again.

      Thou surely canst not bear a mind in pain, Come hand in hand with one so beautiful.

      Be happy both of you! for I will pull

      The flowers of autumn for your coronals.

      Pan’s holy priest for young Endymion calls;

      And when he is restor’d, thou, fairest dame,

      Shalt be our queen. Now, is it not a shame

      To see ye thus,–not very, very sad?

      Perhaps ye are too happy to be glad:

      O feel as if it were a common day;

      Free-voic’d as one who never was away. No tongue shall ask, whence come ye? but ye shall

      Be gods of your own rest imperial.

      Not even I, for one whole month, will pry

      Into the hours that have pass’d us by,

      Since in my arbour I did sing to thee.

      O Hermes! on this very night will be

      A hymning up to Cynthia, queen of light;

      For the soothsayers old saw yesternight

      Good visions in the air,–whence will befal,

      As say these sages, health perpetual To shepherds and their flocks; and furthermore,

      In Dian’s face they read the gentle lore:

      Therefore for her these vesper-carols are.

      Our friends will all be there from nigh and far.

      Many upon thy death have ditties made;

      And many, even now, their foreheads shade

      With cypress, on a day of sacrifice.

      New singing for our maids shalt thou devise,

      And pluck the sorrow from our huntsmen’s brows.

      Tell me, my lady-queen, how to espouse This wayward brother to his rightful joys!

      His eyes are on thee bent, as thou didst poise

      His fate most goddess-like. Help me, I pray,

      To lure–Endymion, dear brother, say

      What ails thee?” He could bear no more, and so

      Bent his soul fiercely like a spiritual bow,

      And twang’d it inwardly, and calmly said:

      “I would have thee my only friend, sweet maid!

      My only visitor! not ignorant though,

      That those deceptions which for pleasure go ‘Mong men, are pleasures real as real may be:

      But there are higher ones I may not see,

      If impiously an earthly realm I take.

      Since I saw thee, I have been wide awake

      Night after night, and day by day, until

      Of the empyrean I have drunk my fill.

      Let it content thee, Sister, seeing me

      More happy than betides mortality.

      A hermit young, I’ll live in mossy cave,

      Where thou alone shalt come to me, and lave Thy spirit in the wonders I shall tell.

      Through me the shepherd realm shall prosper well;

      For to thy tongue will I all health confide.

      And, for my sake, let this young maid abide

      With thee as a dear sister. Thou alone,

      Peona, mayst return to me. I own

      This may sound strangely: but when, dearest girl,

      Thou seest it for my happiness, no pearl

      Will trespass down those cheeks. Companion fair!

      Wilt be content to dwell with her, to share This sister’s love with me?” Like one resign’d

      And bent by circumstance, and thereby blind

      In self-commitment, thus that meek unknown:

      “Aye, but a buzzing by my ears has flown,

      Of jubilee to Dian:–truth I heard!

      Well then, I see there is no little bird,

      Tender soever, but is Jove’s own care.

      Long have I sought for rest, and, unaware,

      Behold I find it! so exalted too!

      So after my own heart! I knew, I knew There was a place untenanted in it:

      In that same void white Chastity shall sit,

      And monitor me nightly to lone slumber.

      With sanest lips I vow me to the number

      Of Dian’s sisterhood; and, kind lady,

      With thy good help, this very night shall see

      My future days to her fane consecrate.”

      As feels a dreamer what doth most create

      His own particular fright, so these three felt:

      Or like one who, in after ages, knelt To Lucifer or Baal, when he’d pine

      After a little sleep: or when in mine

      Far underground, a sleeper meets his friends

      Who know him not. Each diligently bends

      Towards common thoughts and things for very fear;

      Striving their ghastly malady to cheer,

      By thinking it a thing of yes and no,

      That housewives talk of. But the spirit-blow

      Was struck, and all were dreamers. At the last

      Endymion said: “Are not our fates all cast? Why stand we here? Adieu, ye tender pair!

      Adieu!” Whereat those maidens, with wild stare,

      Walk’d dizzily away. Pained and hot

      His eyes went after them, until they got

      Near to a cypress grove, whose deadly maw,

      In one swift moment, would what then he saw

      Engulph for ever. “Stay!” he cried, “ah, stay!

      Turn, damsels! hist! one word I have to say.

      Sweet Indian, I would see thee once again.

      It is a thing I dote on: so I’d fain, Peona, ye should hand in hand repair

      Into those holy groves, that silent are

      Behind great Dian’s temple. I’ll be yon,

      At vesper’s earliest twinkle–they are gone–

      But once, once, once again–” At this he press’d

      His hands against his face, and then did rest

      His head upon a mossy hillock green,

      And so remain’d as he a corpse had been

      All the long day; save when he scantly lifted

      His eyes abroad, to see how shadows shifted With the

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