Patrick McManus wrote:
> Paradise Lost - John Milton
> ... In darkness, and with dangers compassed round, ... Innumerable; and
this
> which
> yields or fills ... This inaccessible high strength, the seat ...
> fcos.us/paradise7.html - 36k - Cached - Similar pages
>
> this in google -patricke
It's not quite Alison's original quote, Patrick.
Oddly enough (if anyone believes this) it had earlier crossed my mind that
it sounded a bit like Shelley (one of Joanna's suggestions) crossed with
Milton (Patrick).
Not to the point of the words but the tone and rhythm called up for me
Shelley's "Tower of Famine" -- A Romantic Replays Milton. [***]
(Another possibility -- Edgar Allan Poe -- is [I think] out as, "Darkness
fills the high seat of power," while perfectly EAP in tone, is too
succinctly worded for him.)
I'd guess it's a made-up 20thC reverse-engineered construct, like the surded
French of Martinique in Alpha Ralpha Boulevard.
Robin
(Who's reading Charles L. Harness' +Redworld+ as he types this.)
***
Amid the desolation of a city,
Which was the cradle, and is now the grave
Of an extinguished people,-so that Pity
Weeps o'er the shipwrecks of Oblivion's wave,
There stands the Tower of Famine. It is built
Upon some prison-homes, whose dwellers rave
For bread, and gold, and blood: Pain, linked to Guilt,
Agitates the light flame of their hours,
Until its vital oil is spent or spilt.
There stands the pile, a tower amid the towers
And sacred domes; each marble-ribbed roof,
The brazen-gated temples, and the bowers
Of solitary wealth,-the tempest-proof
Pavilions of the dark Italian air,-
Are by its presence dimmed-they stand aloof,
And are withdrawn-so that the world is bare;
As if a spectre wrapped in shapeless terror
Amid a company of ladies fair
Should glide and glow, till it became a mirror
Of all their beauty, and their hair and hue,
The life of their sweet eyes, with all its error,
Should be absorbed, till they to marble grew.
|