Anear the centre of that northern crest Stands out a level upland bleak and bare, From which the city east and south and west Sinks gently in long waves; and throned there An Image sits, stupendous, superhuman, 5The bronze colossus of a winged Woman, Upon a graded granite base foursquare.
Low-seated she leans forward massively, With cheek on clenched left hand, the forearm's might Erect, its elbow on her rounded knee; 10Across a clasped book in her lap the right Upholds a pair of compasses; she gazes With full set eyes, but wandering in thick mazes Of sombre thought beholds no outward sight.
Words cannot picture her; but all men know 15That solemn sketch the pure sad artist wrought Three centuries and threescore years ago, With phantasies of his peculiar thought:
The instruments of carpentry and science Scattered about her feet, in strange alliance 20With the keen wolf-hound sleeping undistraught;Scales, hour-glass, bell, and magic-square above;The grave and solid infant perched beside, With open winglets that might bear a dove, Intent upon its tablets, heavy-eyed; 25Her folded wings as of a mighty eagle, But all too impotent to lift the regal Robustness of her earth-born strength and pride;And with those wings, and that light wreath which seems To mock her grand head and the knotted frown 30Of forehead charged with baleful thoughts and dreams, The household bunch of keys, the housewife's gown Voluminous, indented, and yet rigid As if a shell of burnished metal frigid, The feet thick-shod to tread all weakness down; 35The comet hanging o'er the waste dark seas, The massy rainbow curved in front of it Beyond the village with the masts and trees;The snaky imp, dog-headed, from the Pit, Bearing upon its batlike leathern pinions 40Her name unfolded in the sun's dominions, The "MELENCOLIA" that transcends all wit.
Thus has the artist copied her, and thus Surrounded to expound her form sublime, Her fate heroic and calamitous; 45Fronting the dreadful mysteries of Time, Unvanquished in defeat and desolation, Undaunted in the hopeless conflagration Of the day setting on her baffled prime.
Baffled and beaten back she works on still, 50Weary and sick of soul she works the more, Sustained by her indomitable will:
The hands shall fashion and the brain shall pore, And all her sorrow shall be turned to labour, Till Death the friend-foe piercing with his sabre 55That mighty heart of hearts ends bitter war.
But as if blacker night could dawn on night, With tenfold gloom on moonless night unstarred, A sense more tragic than defeat and blight, More desperate than strife with hope debarred,60More fatal than the adamantine Never Encompassing her passionate endeavour, Dawns glooming in her tenebrous regard:
To sense that every struggle brings defeat Because Fate holds no prize to crown success; 65That all the oracles are dumb or cheat Because they have no secret to express;That none can pierce the vast black veil uncertain Because there is no light beyond the curtain;That all is vanity and nothingness.70Titanic from her high throne in the north, That City's sombre Patroness and Queen, In bronze sublimity she gazes forth Over her Capital of teen and threne, Over the river with its isles and bridges, 75The marsh and moorland, to the stern rock-bridges, Confronting them with a coeval mien.
The moving moon and stars from east to west Circle before her in the sea of air;Shadows and gleams glide round her solemn rest.80Her subjects often gaze up to her there:
The strong to drink new strength of iron endurance, The weak new terrors; all, renewed assurance And confirmation of the old despair.
End
