THE RETURN OF THE BRIDE


Brain" which "grew pale with his sickening light" (23:12-13) as soon as he
heard Enion's lamentation. Because Urizen's porches are now "Labyrin-
thine," a word deeply rooted in sexual concealment (see, for example, 4:10
and 27:7), they superimpose the sexual plot over the political/cosmologi-
cal. In turningn] his back" on the "Golden hall" Urizen consciously rejects
the sexual implications that have appeared, contrary to his desires, at
the very center of his creation. This action undermines Urizen's entire
cosmology, for, at the moment Urizen turns his back, Blake identifies
Ahania with the Golden Hall (in lines 30:28-29) by syntactically revealing
that it is the "wide heaven" itself, as well as Ahania, which is "Trembling."
By the end of Night II this trembling of the heavens will result from
Enion's cry, precisely the cause of Urizen's impulse to construct his
cosmos. When Ahania, Urizen's rejected sexual aspect, absorbs Enion's
lamentation, the dialectic Urizen has attempted to overrule re-establishes
itself as Urizen sleeps "on his couch" (36:16).
 Introducing into the narrative proper a brief confrontation between
Urizen and Ahania permits Blake to dramatize throughout the rest of
Night II Urizen's struggle to employ increasingly complex geometrical
tools to cope with threats that more and more frequently break into the
narrative. Most specifically, Urizen's substitution of ambiguous fires for
his own (while not recognizing them as his own) reveals that the ritual
slavery of Luvah and Vala is an aspect of Urizen's turning his back on
Ahania and, in addition, identifies the confrontation between Urizen and
Ahania in Night II with that of Los and Enitharmon in Night I. Blake had
hinted at this relationship when a "Bride" for Urizen, named Ahania,
mysteriously appeared at the Wedding Feast of Los and Enitharmon,
entering the poem in the problematic state of being forgotten.
 The fires that warm the Feminine Semblance immediately make man-
ifest other Females-the Daughters who burn perfumes on the "Altar,"
which the "recess" in the wall has now become. The externalized remnant
of Urizen's sexuality now becomes a sacrificial image. The Daughters'
perfume revives Ahania's languishing "limbs" as do the sons' victims
sacrificed on "an altar ofbrass / On the East side" (30:35-7). This sacrificial
altar requires an even greater workforce than did the palace itself: "terrible
workmanship the Altar labour of ten thousand Slaves" (30:39). These
slaves are no longer exclusively female: "One thousand Men of wondrous
power spent their lives in its formation" (30:40). The pervasive imagery of
slavery and victimization derives from Urizen's decision to turn toward
his desexualizedd) "Labyrinthine porches" and away from the porches
where Enion's lament sounds in Albion's ears.
 The narrative turns from the surrogate satisfaction (the Altar) that Uri-
zen has decreed for Ahania to a momentary confrontation between the two
characters themselves:


The causal circularity of
Urizen's turning his
back on his Golden
Hall/Ahania












The Urizen/Ahania plot
transforms both the sex-
ual recesses of the Thar-
mas/Enion plot and the
fires of the Luvah/Vala
plot.


When Urizen returned from his immense labours & travels
Descending She reposd beside him folding him around
In her bright skirts. Astonishd & Confounded he beheld