# The Poems and Prose Remains of Arthur Hugh Clough/Volume 2/Ἐπὶ Λάτμῳ

Ἐπὶ Λάτμῳ
On the mountain, in the woodland, In the shaded secret dell, I have seen thee, I have met thee! In the soft ambrosial hours of night, In darkness silent sweet I beheld thee, I was with thee, I was thine, and thou wert mine!
When I gazed in palace-chambers, When I trod the rustic dance, Earthly maids were fair to look on, Earthly maidens' hearts were kind: Fair to look on, fair to love: But the life, the life to me, 'Twas the death, the death to them, In the spying, prying, prating Of a curious cruel world. At a touch, a breath they fade, They languish, droop, and die; Yea, the juices change to sourness, And the tints to clammy brown; And the softness unto foulness,
And the odour unto stench. Let alone and leave to bloom; Pass aside, nor make to die, —In the woodland, on the mountain, Thou art mine, and I am thine.
So I passed.—Amid the uplands, In the forests, on whose skirts Pace unstartled, feed unfearing Do the roe-deer and the red, While I hungered, while I thirsted, While the night was deepest dark, Who was I, that thou should’st meet me? Who was I, thou didst not pass? Who was I, that I should say to thee Thou art mine, and I am thine?
To the air from whence thou camest Thou returnest, thou art gone; Self-created, discreated, Re-created, ever fresh, Ever young!—— As a lake its mirrored mountains At a moment, unregretting, Unresisting, unreclaiming, Without preface, without question, On the silent shifting levels Lets depart, Shows, effaces and replaces! For what is, anon is not; What has been, again ’s to be; Ever new and ever young Thou art mine, and I am thine.
Art thou she that walks the skies, That rides the starry night? I know not———— For my meanness dares not claim the truth Thy loveliness declares. But the face thou show’st the world is not The face thou show’st to me; And the look that I have looked in Is of none but me beheld. I know not; but I know I am thine, and thou art mine.
And I watch: the orb behind As it fleeteth, faint and fair In the depth of azure night, In the violet blank, I trace By an outline faint and fair Her whom none but I beheld. By her orb she moveth slow, Graceful-slow, serenely firm, Maiden-Goddess! while her robe The adoring planets kiss. And I too cower and ask, Wert thou mine, and was I thine?
Hath a cloud o’ercast the sky? Is it cloud upon the mountain-sides Or haze of dewy river-banks Below?— Or around me, To enfold me, to conceal, Doth a mystic magic veil, A celestial separation, As of curtains hymeneal,
Undiscerned yet all excluding, Interpose? For the pine-tree boles are dimmer, And the stars bedimmed above; In perspective brief, uncertain, Are the forest-alleys closed, And to whispers indistinctest The resounding torrents lulled. Can it be, and can it be? Upon Earth and here below, In the woodland at my side Thou art with me, thou art here.
'Twas the vapour of the perfume Of the presence that should be, That enwrapt me! That enwraps us, O my Goddess, O my Queen! And I turn At thy feet to fall before thee; And thou wilt not: At thy feet to kneel and reach and kiss thy finger-tips; And thou wilt not: And I feel thine arms that stay me, And I feel———— O mine own, mine own, mine own, I am thine, and thou art mine!