16. 
Yet—­yet—­one brief relapse, like the last beam 4585
Of dying flames, the stainless air around
Hung silent and serene—­a blood-red gleam
Burst upwards, hurling fiercely from the ground
The globed smoke,—­I heard the mighty sound
Of its uprise, like a tempestuous ocean; 4590
And through its chasms I saw, as in a swound,
The tyrant’s child fall without life or motion
Before his throne, subdued by some unseen emotion.—­

17. 
And is this death?—­The pyre has disappeared,
The Pestilence, the Tyrant, and the throng; 4595
The flames grow silent—­slowly there is heard
The music of a breath-suspending song,
Which, like the kiss of love when life is young,
Steeps the faint eyes in darkness sweet and deep;
With ever-changing notes it floats along, 4600
Till on my passive soul there seemed to creep
A melody, like waves on wrinkled sands that leap.

18. 
The warm touch of a soft and tremulous hand
Wakened me then; lo!  Cythna sate reclined
Beside me, on the waved and golden sand 4605
Of a clear pool, upon a bank o’ertwined
With strange and star-bright flowers, which to the wind
Breathed divine odour; high above, was spread
The emerald heaven of trees of unknown kind,
Whose moonlike blooms and bright fruit overhead 4610
A shadow, which was light, upon the waters shed.

19. 
And round about sloped many a lawny mountain
With incense-bearing forests and vast caves
Of marble radiance, to that mighty fountain;
And where the flood its own bright margin laves, 4615
Their echoes talk with its eternal waves,
Which, from the depths whose jagged caverns breed
Their unreposing strife, it lifts and heaves,—­
Till through a chasm of hills they roll, and feed
A river deep, which flies with smooth but arrowy speed. 4620

20. 
As we sate gazing in a trance of wonder,
A boat approached, borne by the musical air
Along the waves which sung and sparkled under
Its rapid keel—­a winged shape sate there,
A child with silver-shining wings, so fair, 4625
That as her bark did through the waters glide,
The shadow of the lingering waves did wear
Light, as from starry beams; from side to side,
While veering to the wind her plumes the bark did guide.

21. 
The boat was one curved shell of hollow pearl, 4630
Almost translucent with the light divine
Of her within; the prow and stern did curl
Horned on high, like the young moon supine,
When o’er dim twilight mountains dark with pine,
It floats upon the sunset’s sea of beams, 4635
Whose golden waves in many a purple line
Fade fast, till borne on sunlight’s ebbing streams,
Dilating, on earth’s verge the sunken meteor gleams.