The Book Of Urizen: Chapter V

1.     In terrors Los shrunk from his task:     His great hammer fell from his hand:     His fires beheld, and sickening,     Hid their strong limbs in smoke.     For with noises ruinous loud;     With hurtlings & clashings & groans     The Immortal endur'd his chains,     Tho' bound in a deadly sleep. 2.     All the myriads of Eternity:     All the wisdom & joy of life:     Roll like a sea around him,     Except what his little orbs     Of sight by degrees unfold. 3.     And now his eternal life     Like a dream was obliterated 4.     Shudd'ring, the Eternal Prophet smote     With a stroke, from his north to south region     The bellows & hammer are silent now     A nerveless silence, his prophetic voice     Siez'd; a cold solitude & dark void     The Eternal Prophet & Urizen clos'd 5.     Ages on ages rolld over them     Cut off from life & light frozen     Into horrible forms of deformity     Los suffer'd his fires to decay     Then he look'd back with anxious desire     But the space undivided by existence     Struck horror into his soul. 6.     Los wept obscur'd with mourning:     His bosom earthquak'd with sighs;     He saw Urizen deadly black,     In his chains bound, & Pity began, 7.     In anguish dividing & dividing     For pity divides the soul     In pangs eternity on eternity     Life in cataracts pourd down his cliffs     The void shrunk the lymph into Nerves     Wand'ring wide on the bosom of night     And left a round globe of blood     Trembling upon the Void     Thus the Eternal Prophet was divided     Before the death-image of Urizen     For in changeable clouds and darkness     In a winterly night beneath,     The Abyss of Los stretch'd immense:     And now seen, now obscur'd, to the eyes     Of Eternals, the visions remote     Of the dark seperation appear'd.     As glasses discover Worlds     In the endless Abyss of space,     So the expanding eyes of Immortals     Beheld the dark visions of Los,     And the globe of life blood trembling 8.     The globe of life blood trembled     Branching out into roots;     Fib'rous, writhing upon the winds;     Fibres of blood, milk and tears;     In pangs, eternity on eternity.     At length in tears & cries imbodied     A female form trembling and pale     Waves before his deathy face 9.     All Eternity shudderd at sight     Of the first female now separate     Pale as a cloud of snow     Waving before the face of Los 10.     Wonder, awe, fear, astonishment,     Petrify the eternal myriads;     At the first female form now separate     They call'd her Pity, and fled 11.     "Spread a Tent, with strong curtains around them     "Let cords & stakes bind in the Void     That Eternals may no more behold them" 12.     They began to weave curtains of darkness     They erected large pillars round the Void     With golden hooks fastend in the pillars     With infinite labour the Eternals     A woof wove, and called it Science