"O virgin, know'st thou not our steeds drink of the golden springs Where Luvah5 doth renew his horses? Look'st thou on my youth, And fearest thou because I vanish and am seen no more,
10 Nothing remains? O maid, I tell thee, when I pass away, It is to tenfold life, to love, to peace, and raptures holy: Unseen descending, weigh my light wings upon balmy flowers, And court the fair eyed dew, to take me to her shining tent; The weeping virgin trembling kneels before the risen sun,
is Till we arise link'd in a golden band, and never part, But walk united, bearing food to all our tender flowers."
"Dost thou O little Cloud? I fear that I am not like thee; For I walk through the vales of Har and smell the sweetest flowers, But I feed not the little flowers; I hear the warbling birds,
20 But I feed not the warbling birds; they fly and seek their food; But Thel delights in these no more, because I fade away, And all shall say, 'Without a use this shining woman liv'd, Or did she only live to be at death the food of worms?' "
The Cloud reclind upon his airy throne and answer'd thus:
25 "Then if thou art the food of worms, O virgin of the skies, How great thy use, how great thy blessing! Every thing that lives Lives not alone, nor for itself; fear not, and I will call The weak worm from its lowly bed, and thou shalt hear its voice. Come forth, worm of the silent valley, to thy pensive queen."
30 The helpless worm arose, and sat upon the Lilly's leaf, And the bright Cloud saild on, to find his partner in the vale.
PLATE 4
3
Then Thel astonish'd view'd the Worm upon its dewy bed.
"Art thou a Worm? Image of weakness, art thou but a Worm? I see thee like an infant wrapped in the Lilly's leaf; Ah, weep not, little voice, thou can'st not speak, but thou can'st weep.
5. The earliest mention in Blake's work of one of sun; he repairs to the Vales of Har simply to rest his "Giant Forms," the Zoas. Luvah is the mythical and water his horses. The cloud in this passage embodiment of the passional and sexual aspect of describes the cycle of water, from cloud to rain and humankind. He is represented here, like the Greek (by the vaporizing action of the sun on water) back Phoebus Apollo, as the driver of the chariot of the to the cloud.
.
THE BOOK OF THEL / 101
Is this a Worm? I see thee lay helpless & naked, weeping, And none to answer, none to cherish thee with mother's smiles."
The Clod of Clay heard the Worm's voice, & raisd her pitying head; She bow'd over the weeping infant, and her life exhal'd In milky fondness; then on Thel she fix'd her humble eyes.
"O beauty of the vales of Har! we live not for ourselves; Thou seest me the meanest thing, and so I am indeed; My bosom of itself is cold, and of itself is dark,
PLATE 5
But he that loves the lowly, pours his oil upon my head, And kisses me, and binds his nuptial bands around my breast, And says: 'Thou mother of my children, I have loved thee, And I have given thee a crown that none can take away.' But how this is, sweet maid, I know not, and I cannot know; I ponder, and I cannot ponder; yet I live and love."
The daughter of beauty wip'd her pitying tears with her white veil, And said: "Alas! I knew not this, and therefore did I weep. That God would love a Worm, I knew, and punish the evil foot That, wilful, bruis'd its helpless form; but that he cherish'd it With milk and oil I never knew; and therefore did I weep, And I complaind in the mild air, because I fade away, And lay me down in thy cold bed, and leave my shining lot."
"Queen of the vales," the matron Clay answered, "I heard thy sighs, And all thy moans flew o'er my roof, but I have call'd them down. Wilt thou, O Queen, enter my house? 'tis given thee to enter And to return; fear nothing, enter with thy virgin feet."
PLATE 6
4
The eternal gates' terrific porter lifted the northern bar:6 Thel enter'd in & saw the secrets of the land unknown. She saw the couches of the dead, & where the fibrous roots Of every heart on earth infixes deep its restless twists: A land of sorrows & of tears where never smile was seen.
She wanderd in the land of clouds thro' valleys dark, Iistning Dolours & lamentations; waiting oft beside a dewy grave, She stood in silence, Iistning to the voices of the ground, Till to her own grave plot she came, & there she sat down, And heard this voice of sorrow breathed from the hollow pit:
"Why cannot the Ear be closed to its own destruction? Or the glistning Eye to the poison of a smile?
6. Homer, in Odyssey 13, described the Cave of tonist Porphyry had allegorized it as an account of the Naiades, of which the northern gate is for mor- the descent of the soul into matter and then its tals and the southern gate for gods. The neopla- return.
.
102 / WILLIAM BLAKE
Why are Eyelids stord with arrows ready drawn, Where a thousand fighting men in ambush lie? Or an Eye of gifts & graces, show'ring fruits & coined gold? Why a Tongue impress'd with honey from every wind? Why an Ear, a whirlpool fierce to draw creations in? Why a Nostril wide inhaling terror, trembling, & affright? Why a tender curb upon the youthful burning boy? Why a little curtain of flesh on the bed of our desire?"
The Virgin started from her seat, & with a shriek Fled back unhinderd till she came into the vales of Har.
1789-91
Visions of the Daughters of Albion This work, dated 1793 on the title page, is one of Blake's early illuminated books, and like his later and longer works is written in what Blake called "the long resounding strong heroic verse" of seven-foot lines. Unlike the timid heroine of The Book of Thel, the virgin Oothoon dares to break through into adult sexuality (symbolized by her plucking a marigold and placing it between her breasts) and sets out joyously to join her lover Theotormon, whose realm is the Atlantic Ocean. She is stopped and raped by Bromion, who appears as a thunderstorm (1.16�17). The jealous Theotormon, condemning the victim as well as the rapist, binds the two "back to back" in a cave and sits weeping on the threshold. The rest of the work consists of monologues by the three characters, who remain fixed in these postures. Throughout this stage tableau the Daughters of Albion serve as the chorus who, in a recurrent refrain, echo the "woes" and "sighs" of Oothoon, but not
her call to rebellion.
This simple drama is densely significant, for as Blake's compressed allusions indicate, the characters, events, and monologues have diverse areas of application. Blake's abrupt opening word, which he etched in very large letters, is Enslav'd, and the work as a whole embodies his view that contemporary men, and even more women, in a spiritual parallel to shackled black slaves, are in bondage to oppressive concepts and codes in all aspects of perception, thought, social institutions, and actions. As indicated by the refrain of the Daughters of Albion (that is, contemporary Englishwomen), Oothoon in one aspect represents the sexual disabilities and slavelike status of all women in a male-dominated society. But as "the soft soul of America" (1.3) she is also the revolutionary nation that had recently won political emancipation, yet continued to tolerate an agricultural system that involved black slavery and to acquiesce in the crass economic exploitation of her "soft American plains." At the same time Oothoon is represented in the situation of a black female slave who has been branded, whipped, raped, and impregnated by her master.