{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/wikisource_Orion_Book_I_Canto_III/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/wikisource_Orion_Book_I_Canto_III","id":"wikisource_Orion_Book_I_Canto_III","license":"Public Domain / CC-BY-SA (see source)","rights_basis":"wikisource_site_inclusion_policy","source":"wikisource","source_url":"https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Orion/Book_I/Canto_III","summary":null,"tags":["Subpages"],"text":"ORION.\n\nCanto the Third.\n\nO'er plastic nature any change may come,\nSave that which seeks to crush the primal germ;\nAnd outward circumstance may breed within,\nA second nature which o'ercomes the first,\nBut ne'er destroys, though dormant or subdued.\nMore toil for him whose wandering fancies teem\nWith too much life, and that vitality\nWhich eats into itself; more toil of brain\nAnd limb, sole panacea for the change\nFrom tyrant senses to pure intellect.\nWherefore, his work redoubled, Artemis\nDirects Orion's course; not as before\nWith grave and all-subduing tenderness,\nWhile with white fingers midst his chestnut locks,\nIn her speech pausing, gently would she hang\nViolets, as white as her own hands, and sprigs\nOf Cretan dittany, whose nodding spikes\nFlushed deeper pink beneath the sacred touch,\u2014\nBut with a penetrating influence\nAnd front austere, as suiting best the Queen\nOf maiden immortality. His soul\nStrove hard to ascend and leave the earth behind;\nAnd by the Goddess' guidance every hour\nHad its fixed duties. Husbandry of fields\nShe taught those giant hands, and how to raise\nThe sweetest herbs and roots, which now his food\nBecame; nor taste and culture of the vine\nPermitted, nor of slaughtered kine the flesh,\nNor forest boar, nor other thing that owns\nAn animal life. Lastly, she taught his mind\nTo reason on itself, far as the bounds\nOf sense external furnish images\nAnd types in attestation of each phase\nOf man's internal sphere\u2014large orbit space\nFor varied lights\u2014and also shewed the way\nRightly his complex knowledge to employ,\nAnd from their shadows trace substantial things,\nThings back again to shadows\u2014thus evolving\nThe principle of thought, from root to air.\n\nThis done, the blossom and the fruit of all\nWas her prime truth, into each element\nOf his life's feelings and its acts, to instil:\n'T was Love's divinest essence. In the soul,\nCentral its altar's flame for ever burns\nInviolate, and knowing not the change\nWhich time and fate o'er all else in the world\nBring speedily, or with a creeping film\nThat hides decay. Ever at peace it dwells\nWith its secure desires, which are soul-fed,\nNor on idolatrous devotion made\nDependent, nor on will and wayward moods\nOf others; 't is self-centred as a star,\nAnd in the music of the conscious nerves,\nFinds bliss, which e'en the slightest touch or look\nOf this magnetic passion can create,\nAnd render perfect. Nor doth absence break\nThe links of ecstasy, which from a heart\nBy heart are drawn, but 'midst the glare of day,\nThe depths of night, alone or in a crowd,\nImagination of love's balmy breath\nCan to the spirit fashion and expand\nLove's own pure rapture and delirium.\nTo this fixed sublimation there belong\nNo conflicts of pale doubts, anxieties,\nMean jealousies, anguish of heart-crushed slaves,\nAnd forlorn faces looking out on seas\nOf coming madness, from the stony gaps\nThrough which departed truth and bliss have fled;\nBut high communion, and a rapturous sense\nOf passion's element, whereof all life\nIs made\u00a0; and therefore life should ne'er attain\nA mastery o'er its pure creative light.\n\nMidst chequered sunbeams through the glancing woods\nNo more Orion hunted; from the dawn\nTill eve, within some lonely grot he sat,\nHis thoughts reviewing, or beneath a rock\nStood, back reclined, and watching the slow clouds,\nAs doth a shepherd in a vacant mood.\nOft to some highest peak would he ascend,\nAnd gaze below upon his giant friends,\nWho looked like moving spots, so dark and small;\nAnd oft, upon some green cliff ledge reclined,\nWatch with sad eye the jocund chase afar\nIn the green landscape, where the quivering line\nLed by the stag\u2014who drew its rout behind\nOf woodland shapes, confused as were their cries,\nAnd sparkling bodies of fleet-chasing hounds,\u2014\nPassed like a magic picture, and was gone.\nHis husbandry soon ceased; he hated toil\nUnvaried, ending always in itself,\nAnd to the Goddess pleaded thoughtful hours\nFor his excuse, and indolent self-disgust.\nSmall profit found his thought; his sympathies\nWere driven inward, and corroded there.\n\nSometimes he wandered to the lowland fens,\nWhere the wild mares toss their sharp manes in the blast,\nAnd scour through washy reeds and hollows damp\u2014\nHardened in after ages by long droughts;\nArid and stony in the present time\u2014\nAnd midst the elements he sought relief\nFrom inward tempests. Once for many hours,\nIn silence, only broken from afar\nBy the deep lowing of some straying herd,\nMoveless and without speech he watched a hind\nWeeding a marsh; a brutish clod, half built,\nHog-faced and hog-backed with his daily toil,\nMudded and root-stained by the steaming ooze,\nAs he himself were some unnatural growth;\nWho yet, at times, whistled through broken fangs\u2014\n\"Happier than I, this hind,\" Orion thought.\n\nOnce tow'rds the city outskirts strayed his steps,\nWith a half purpose some relief to seek\nMidst haunts of men, and on the way he met\nA mastic-sifter with his fresh-oiled face.\n\"O friend!\" Orion said, \"why dost thou walk\nWith shining cheek so sadly in the sun?\"\nSighing, the melancholy man replied:\u2014\n\"The lentisk-trees have ceased to shed their gums;\nTheir tears are changed for mine, since by that tree\nMyself and children live. My toil stands still.\nHard lot for man, who something hath within\nMore than a tree, and higher than its top,\nOr circling clouds, to live by a mere root\nAnd its dark graspings! Clearly I see this,\nAnd know how 't is that toil unequally\nIs shared on earth: but knowledge is not power\nTo a poor man alone 'gainst all the world,\nWho, meantime, needs to eat. Like the hot springs\nThat boil themselves away, and serve for nought,\nWhich yet must have some office, rightly used,\nMan hath a secret source, for some great end,\nWhich by delay seems wasted. Ignorance\nChokes us, and time outwits us.\"\u2014On he passed.\n\"That soul hath greater cause for grief than I,\"\nOrion thought\u2014yet not the less was sad.\n\nAway disconsolate the giant went,\nNow clambering forest slopes, now hurrying down\nPrecipitous brakes, tearing the berried boughs\nFor food, scarce tasted, and oft gathering husks,\nOr wind-eggs of strange birds dropt in the fens,\nTo toss them in some rapid brook, and watch\nTheir wavering flight. But now a tingling sound\nWakes his dull ear!\u2014a distant rising drone\nUpon the air, as of a wintry wind\u2014\nAnd dry leaves rustle like a coming rain.\nThe wind is here; and, following soon, descends\nA tempest, which relieves its rage in tears.\nKneeling he stooped, and drank the hissing flood,\nAnd wished the Ogygian deluge were returned;\nThen sat in very wilfulness beside\nThe banks while they o'erflowed, till starting up,\nBounding he sought his early giant friends.\n\nThem, in their pastoral yet half savage haunts\nFound, as of yore, he with brief speech addressed,\nAnd bade them to an orgie on the plain,\nBy rocks and forests amphitheatred.\nSuch greeting high they with a gleeful roar\nReceived, and forthwith rose to follow him,\nSave Akinetos, who seemed not to hear,\nBut looked more grave still seated on a stone,\nWhile they betook them to the plains below.\n\nThither at once they sped, and on the way\nRhexergon tore down boughs, while Harpax slew\nOxen and deer, more than was need; and soon\nOn the green space Orion built the pile\nWith cross logs, underwood, dry turf and ferns,\nAnd cast upon it fat of kine, and heaps\nOf crisp dry leaves; and fired the pile, and beat\nA hollow shield, and called the Bacchic train,\nWho brought their skins of wine, and loaded poles\nThat bent with mighty clusters of black grapes\nSlung midway. In the blaze Orion threw\nChoice gums, and oil, that with explosion bright\nOf broad and lucid flame alarmed the sky,\nAnd fragrant spice, then set the Fauns to dance,\nWhile whirled the timbrels, and the reed-pipes blew\nA full-toned melody of mad delight.\nDown came the M\u00e6nads from the sun-brown hills,\nAnd flocked the laughing Nymphs of groves and brooks;\nWith whom came Opis, singing to a lyre,\nAnd Sida, ivory-limbed and crowned with flowers.\nHigh swelled the orgie; and the roasting bulk\nOf bull and deer was scarce distinguishable\n'Mid the loud-crackling boughs that sprawled in flame.\nNow richest odours rose, and filled the air\u2014\nMade glittering with the cymbals spun on high\nThrough jets of nectar upward cast in sport,\nAnd raging with songs and laughter and wild cries.\n\nIn the first pause for breath and deeper draughts,\nA Faun who on a quiet green knoll sat\nSomewhat apart, sang a melodious ode,\nMade rich by harmonies of hidden strings,\nUnto bright Merope the island's pride,\nAnd daughter of the king; whereto a quire\nGave chorus, and her beauties rare rehearsing,\nWished that Orion shared with her the throne.\n\nThe wine ran wastefully, and o'er the ears\nOf the tall jars that stood too near the fire,\nBubbled and leapt, and streamed in crimsoning foam,\nHot as the hissing sap of the green logs.\nBut none took heed of that, nor anything.\nThus song and feast, dance, and wild revelry,\nSucceeded; now in turn, now all at once\nMingling tempestuously. In a blind whirl\nAround the fire Biastor dragged a rout\nIn osier bands and garlands; Harpax fiercely\nThe violet scarfs and autumn-tinted robes\nFrom Nymph and M\u00e6nad tore; and by the hoofs\nAutarces seized a Satyr, with intent,\nDespite his writhing freaks and furious face,\nTo dash him on a gong, but that amidst\nThe struggling mass Encolyon thrust a pine,\nHeavy and black as Charon's ferrying pole,\nO'er which they, like a bursting billow, fell.\n\nAt length when night came folding round the scene,\nAnd golden lights grew red and terrible,\nFlashed torch and spear, while reed-pipes deeper blew\nSonorous dirgings and melodious storm,\nAnd timbrels groaned and jangled to the tones\nOf high-sustaining horns,\u2014then round the blaze,\nTheir shadows brandishing afar and athwart\nOver the level space and up the hills,\nSix giants held portentous dance, nor ceased\nTill one by one in bare Bacchante arms,\nBrim-full of nectar, helplessly they rolled\nDeep down oblivion. Sleep absorbed their souls.\n\nRegion of Dreams! ye seething procreant beds\nFor germs of life's solidities and power;\nWhether ye render up from other spheres\nOur past or future beings to the ken\nOf this brief state; or, wiser, art designed,\nWith all thy fleeting images confused,\nTo scatter, during half our mortal hours,\nThe concentrating passions and the thoughts\nWhich else were madness; Oh maternal realm,\nConsole each troubled heart!\u2014with opiate hand\nGently the senses charm, and lead astray\nThe vulture thoughts by thy blest phantasies,\nBeckoning with vague yet irresistible smile!\n\nSleep's God the prayer well pleased received, but said\n\"Not such the meed of those who seek my courts\nThrough Bacchanalian orgies.\" O'er the brain\nOf fallen Orion visions suitable\nCame with voluptuous gorgeousness, preceded\nBy a dim ode; and as it nearer swelled,\nIn rapturous beauty Merope swept by,\nWho on him gazed in ecstasy! He strove\nTo rise\u2014to speak\u2014in vain. Yet still she gazed,\nAnd still he strove; till a voice cried in his ear,\n\"Depart from Artemis!\u2014she loves thee not\u2014\nThou art too full of earth! \" He started awake!\nThe piercing voice that cast him forth, still rang\nWithin his soul; the vision of delight\nStill ached along each nerve; and slowly turning\nA look perplexed around the spectral air,\nHimself he found alone 'neath the cold sky\nOf day-break, midst black ashes and ruins drear.","title":"Orion/Book I/Canto III","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":1934}