# Prometheus Unbound; a lyrical drama in four acts with other poems/A Vision of the Sea

A VISION OF THE SEA.
’Tis the terror of tempest. The rags of the sail Are flickering in ribbons within the fierce gale: From the stark night of vapours the dim rain is driven, And when lightning is loosed, like a deluge from heaven, She sees the black trunks of the water-spouts spin, And bend, as if heaven was raining in, Which they seem’d to sustain with their terrible mass As if ocean had sank from beneath them: they pass To their graves in the deep with an earthquake of sound, And the waves and the thunders made silent around Leave the wind to its echo. The vessel, now toss’d Through the low-trailing rack of the tempest, is lost
In the skirts of the thunder-cloud: now down the sweep Of the wind-cloven wave to the chasm of the deep It sinks, and the walls of the watery vale Whose depths of dread calm are unmoved by the gale, Dim mirrors of ruin hang gleaming about; While the surf, like a chaos of stars, like a rout Of death-flames, like whirlpools of fire-flowing iron With splendour and terror the black ship environ, Or like sulphur-flakes hurl'd from a mine of pale fire In fountains spout o'er it. In many a spire The pyramid-billows with white points of brine In the cope of the lightning inconstantly shine, As piercing the sky from the floor of the sea. The great ship seems splitting! it cracks as a tree, While an earthquake is splintering its root, ere the blast Of the whirlwind that stripped it of branches has past. The intense thunder-balls which are raining from heaven Have shatter'd its mast, and it stands black and riven. The chinks suck destruction. The heavy dead hulk On the living sea rolls an inanimate bulk, Like a corpse on the clay which is hung'ring to fold Its corruption around it. Meanwhile, from the hold, One deck is burst up from the waters below, And it splits like the ice when the thaw-breezes blow
O'er the lakes of the desart! Who sit on the other? Is that all the crew that lie burying each other, Like the dead in a breach, round the foremast? Are those Twin tygers, who burst, when the waters arose, In the agony of terror, their chains in the hold; (What now makes them tame, is what then made them bold;) Who crouch, side by side, and have driven, like a crank, The deep grip of their claws through the vibrating plank. Are these all? Nine weeks the tall vessel had lain On the windless expanse of the watery plain, Where the death-darting sun cast no shadow at noon, And there seem'd to be fire in the beams of the moon, Till a lead-colour'd fog gather'd up from the deep Whose breath was quick pestilence; then, the cold sleep Crept, like blight through the ears of a thick field of corn, O'er the populous vessel. And even and morn, With their hammocks for coffins the seamen aghast Like dead men the dead limbs of their comrades cast Down the deep, which closed on them above and around, And the sharks and the dog-fish their grave-clothes unbound,
And were glutted like Jews with this manna rain'd down From God on their wilderness. One after one The mariners died; on the eve of this day, When the tempest was gathering in cloudy array, But seven remain'd. Six the thunder has smitten, And they lie black as mummies on which Time has written His scorn of the embalmer; the seventh, from the deck An oak-splinter pierced through his breast and his back, And hung out to the tempest, a wreck on the wreck. No more? At the helm sits a woman more fair Than heaven, when, unbinding its star-braided hair, It sinks with the sun on the earth and the sea. She clasps a bright child on her upgather'd knee, It laughs at the lightning, it mocks the mixed thunder Of the air and the sea, with desire and with wonder It is beckoning the tygers to rise and come near, It would play with those eyes where the radiance of fear Is outshining the meteors; its bosom beats high, The heart-fire of pleasure has kindled its eye; Whilst its mother's is lustreless. "Smile not, my child, "But sleep deeply and sweetly, and so be beguiled "Of the pang that awaits us, whatever that be, "So dreadful since thou must divide it with me!
"Dream, sleep! This pale bosom, thy cradle and bed, "Will it rock thee not, infant? 'Tis beating with dread! "Alas! what is life, what is death, what are we, "That when the ship sinks we no longer may be? "What! to see thee no more, and to feel thee no more? "To be after life what we have been before? "Not to touch those sweet hands? Not to look on those eyes. "Those lips, and that hair, all that smiling disguise "Thou yet wearest, sweet spirit, which I, day by day, "Have so long called my child, but which now fades away "Like a rainbow, and I the fallen shower?" Lo! the ship Is settling, it topples, the leeward ports dip; The tygers leap up when they feel the slow brine Crawling inch by inch on them, hair, ears, limbs, and eyne, Stand rigid with horror; a loud, long, hoarse cry Bursts at once from their vitals tremendously, And 'tis borne down the mountainous vale of the wave, Rebounding, like thunder, from crag to cave, Mixed with the clash of the lashing rain, Hurried on by the might of the hurricane: The hurricane came from the west, and past on By the path of the gate of the eastern sun,
Transversely dividing the stream of the storm; As an arrowy serpent, pursuing the form Of an elephant, bursts through the brakes of the waste. Black as a cormorant the screaming blast, Between ocean and heaven, like an ocean, past, Till it came to the clouds on the verge of the world Which, based on the sea and to heaven upcurl'd, Like columns and walls did surround and sustain The dome of the tempest; it rent them in twain, As a flood rends its barriers of mountainous crag: And the dense clouds in many a ruin and rag, Like the stones of a temple ere earthquake has past, Like the dust of its fall, on the whirlwind are cast; They are scatter'd like foam on the torrent; and where The wind has burst out from the chasm, from the air Of clear morning, the beams of the sunrise flow in, Unimpeded, keen, golden, and crystalline, Banded armies of light and of air; at one gate They encounter, but interpenetrate. And that breach in the tempest is widening away, And the caverns of clouds are torn up by the day, And the fierce winds are sinking with weary wings Lulled by the motion and murmurings,
And the long glassy heave of the rocking sea, And over head glorious, but dreadful to see The wrecks of the tempest, like vapours of gold, Are consuming in sunrise. The heaped waves behold The deep calm of blue heaven dilating above, And, like passions made still by the presence of Love, Beneath the clear surface reflecting it slide Tremulous with soft influence; extending its tide From the Andes to Atlas, round mountain and isle, Round sea-birds and wrecks, paved with heaven's azure smile. The wide world of waters is vibrating. Where Is the ship? On the verge of the wave where it lay One tyger is mingled in ghastly affray With a sea-snake. The foam and the smoke of the battle Stain the clear air with sunbows; the jar, and the rattle Of solid bones crush'd by the infinite stress Of the snake's adamantine voluminousness; And the hum of the hot blood that spouts and rains Where the gripe of the tyger has wounded the veins, Swollen with rage, strength, and effort; the whirl and the splash As of some hideous engine whose brazen teeth smash The thin winds and soft waves into thunder; the screams And hissings crawl fast o'er the smooth ocean streams,
Each sound like a centipede. Near this commotion, A blue shark is hanging within the blue ocean, The fin-winged tomb of the victor. The other Is winning his way from the fate of his brother, To his own with the speed of despair. Lo! a boat Advances; twelve rowers with the impulse of thought Urge on the keen keel, the brine foams. At the stern Three marksmen stand levelling. Hot bullets burn In the breast of the tyger, which yet bears him on To his refuge and ruin. One fragment alone, 'Tis dwindling and sinking, 'tis now almost gone, Of the wreck of the vessel peers out of the sea. With her left hand she grasps it impetuously, With her right she sustains her fair infant. Death, Fear, Love, Beauty, are mixed in the atmosphere; Which trembles and burns with the fervour of dread Around her wild eyes, her bright hand, and her head, Like a meteor of light o'er the waters! her child Is yet smiling, and playing, and murmuring; so smiled The false deep ere the storm. Like a sister and brother The child and the ocean still smile on each other, Whilst———