160
And our almighty Tyrant with fierce dread
Grew pale, until his thunder chained thee here. 
Then, see those million worlds which burn and roll
Around us:  their inhabitants beheld
My sphered light wane in wide Heaven; the sea 165
Was lifted by strange tempest, and new fire
From earthquake-rifted mountains of bright snow
Shook its portentous hair beneath Heaven’s frown;
Lightning and Inundation vexed the plains;
Blue thistles bloomed in cities; foodless toads 170
Within voluptuous chambers panting crawled: 
When Plague had fallen on man, and beast, and worm,
And Famine; and black blight on herb and tree;
And in the corn, and vines, and meadow-grass,
Teemed ineradicable poisonous weeds 175
Draining their growth, for my wan breast was dry
With grief; and the thin air, my breath, was stained
With the contagion of a mother’s hate
Breathed on her child’s destroyer; ay, I heard
Thy curse, the which, if thou rememberest not, 180
Yet my innumerable seas and streams,
Mountains, and caves, and winds, and yon wide air,
And the inarticulate people of the dead,
Preserve, a treasured spell.  We meditate
In secret joy and hope those dreadful words, 185
But dare not speak them.

NOTE: 
137 And love 1820; And lovest cj.  Swinburne.

PROMETHEUS: 
Venerable mother! 
All else who live and suffer take from thee
Some comfort; flowers, and fruits, and happy sounds,
And love, though fleeting; these may not be mine. 
But mine own words, I pray, deny me not. 190

THE EARTH: 
They shall be told.  Ere Babylon was dust,
The Magus Zoroaster, my dead child,
Met his own image walking in the garden. 
That apparition, sole of men, he saw. 
For know there are two worlds of life and death:  195
One that which thou beholdest; but the other
Is underneath the grave, where do inhabit
The shadows of all forms that think and live
Till death unite them and they part no more;
Dreams and the light imaginings of men, 200
And all that faith creates or love desires,
Terrible, strange, sublime and beauteous shapes. 
There thou art, and dost hang, a writhing shade,
’Mid whirlwind-peopled mountains; all the gods
Are there, and all the powers of nameless worlds, 205
Vast, sceptred phantoms; heroes, men, and beasts;
And Demogorgon, a tremendous gloom;
And he, the supreme Tyrant, on his throne
Of burning gold.  Son, one of these shall utter
The curse which all remember.  Call at will 210
Thine own ghost, or the ghost of Jupiter,
Hades or Typhon, or what mightier Gods
From all-prolific Evil, since thy ruin,
Have sprung, and trampled on my prostrate sons. 
Ask, and they must reply:  so the revenge 215
Of the Supreme may sweep through vacant shades,
As rainy wind through the abandoned gate
Of a fallen palace.