Page:Prometheus bound - Browning (1833).djvu/119

My deep unslumb'ring dream, but utter'd naught.
My living I uncoupled from the dead,
And look'd out, 'mid the swart and sluggish air,
For place to make a grave. A mighty tree
Above me, his gigantic arms outstretch'd,
Poising the clouds. A thousand mutter'd spells
Of every ancient wind and thund'rous storm,
Had been off-shaken from his scathless bark.
He had heard distant years sweet concord yield,
And go to silence; having firmly kept
Majestical companionship with Time.
Anon his strength wax'd proud: his tusky roots
Forced for themselves a path on every side,
Riving the earth; and, in their savage scorn,
Casting it from them like a thing unclean,
Which might impede his naked clambering
Unto the heavens. Now blasted, peel'd, he stood,
By the gone night, whose lightning had come in
And rent him, even as it rent the man