20.

  The leprous corpse, touched by this spirit tender,
    Exhales itself in flowers of gentle breath;
  Like incarnations of the stars, when splendour
    Is changed to fragrance, they illumine death,
    And mock the merry worm that wakes beneath. 5
  Nought we know dies:  shall that alone which knows
    Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
  By sightless lightning?  Th’ intense atom glows
A moment, then is quenched in a most cold repose.

21.

  Alas that all we loved of him should be,
    But for our grief, as if it had not been,
  And grief itself be mortal!  Woe is me! 
    Whence are we, and why are we? of what scene
    The actors or spectators?  Great and mean 5
  Meet massed in death, who lends what life must borrow. 
    As long as skies are blue and fields are green,
  Evening must usher night, night urge the morrow,
Month follow month with woe, and year wake year to sorrow.

22.

  He will awake no more, oh never more! 
    ‘Wake thou,’ cried Misery, ’childless Mother; Rise
  Out of thy sleep, and slake in thy heart’s core
    A wound more fierce than his, with tears and sighs.’ 
    And all the Dreams that watched Urania’s eyes, 5
  And all the Echoes whom their Sister’s song
    Had held in holy silence, cried ‘Arise!’
  Swift as a thought by the snake memory stung,
From her ambrosial rest the fading Splendour sprung.

23.

  She rose like an autumnal Night that springs
    Out of the east, and follows wild and drear
  The golden Day, which on eternal wings,
    Even as a ghost abandoning a bier,
    Had left the Earth a corpse.  Sorrow and fear 5
  So struck, so roused, so rapt, Urania;
    So saddened round her like an atmosphere
  Of stormy mist; so swept her on her way,
Even to the mournful place where Adonais lay.

24.

  Out of her secret paradise she sped,
    Through camps and cities rough with stone and steel
  And human hearts, which, to her aery tread
    Yielding not, wounded the invisible
    Palms of her tender feet where’er they fell. 5
  And barbed tongues, and thoughts more sharp than they,
    Rent the soft form they never could repel,
  Whose sacred blood, like the young tears of May,
Paved with eternal flowers that undeserving way.

25.

  In the death-chamber for a moment Death,
    Shamed by the presence of that living might,
  Blushed to annihilation, and the breath
    Revisited those lips, and life’s pale light
    Flashed through those limbs so late her dear delight. 5
  ’Leave me not wild and drear and comfortless,
    As silent lightning leaves the starless night! 
  Leave me not!’ cried Urania.  Her distress
Roused Death:  Death rose and smiled, and met her vain caress.