Should e'er unhappy love my bosom pain, From cruel parents, or relentless fair, O let me think it is not quite in vain
To sigh out sonnets to the midnight air! Sweet Hope! ethereal balm upon me shed, And wave thy silver pinions o'er my head.
In the long vista of the years to roll,
Let me not see our country's honor fade! C let me see our land retain her soul !
Her pride, her freedom; and not freedom's shade. From thy bright eyes unusual brightness shedBeneath thy pinions canopy my head!
Let me not see the patriot's high bequest,
Great Liberty! how great in plain attire! With the base purple of a court oppress'd,
Bowing her head, and ready to expire: But let me see thee stoop from Heaven on wings That fill the skies with silver glitterings!
And as, in sparkling majesty, a star
Gilds the bright summit of some gloomy cloud; Brightening the half-veil'd face of heaven afar: So, when dark thoughts my boding spirit shroud, Sweet Hope! celestial influence round me shed, Waving thy silver pinions o'er my head. February, 1815.
Now Morning from her orient chamber came, And her first footstep touch'd a verdant hill: Crowning its lawny crest with amber flame, Silvering the untainted gushes of its rill; Which, pure from mossy beds, did down distil, And, after parting beds of simple flowers, By many streams a little lake did fill,
Which round its marge reflected woven bowers, And, in its middle space, a sky that never lowers.
There the kingfisher saw his plumage bright, Vying with fish of brilliant dye below; Whose silken fins' and golden scales' light Cast upward, through the waves, a ruby glow: There saw the swan his neck of arched snow, And oar'd himself along with majesty ; Sparkled his jetty eyes; his feet did show Beneath the waves like Afric's ebony, And on his back a fay reclined voluptuously
Ah! could I tell the wonders of an isle That in that fairest lake had placed been, I could e'en Dido of her grief beguile; Or rob from aged Lear his bitter teen : For sure so fair a place was never seen Of all that ever charm'd romantic eye: It seem'd an emerald in the silver sheen Of the bright waters; or as when on high, Through clouds of fleecy white, laughs the cerulean sky.
And all around it dipp'd luxuriously Slopings of verdure through the glossy tide, Which, as were in gentle amity, Rippled delighted up the flowery side;
As if to glean the ruddy tears it tried, Which fell profusely from the rose-tree stem! Haply it was the workings of its pride, In strife to throw upon the shore a gem Outvying all the buds in Flora's diadem.
WOMAN! when I behold thee flippant, vain, Inconstant, childish, proud, and full of fancies; Without that modest softening that enhances The downcast eye, repentant of the pain That its mild light creates to heal again; E'en then, elate, my spirit leaps and prances, E'en then my soul with exultation dances For that to love, so long, I've dormant lain: But when I see thee meek, and kind, and tender Heavens! how desperately do I adore Thy winning graces;-to be thy defender I hotly burn-to be a Calidore- A very Red-Cross Knight-a stout Leander- Might I be loved by thee like these of yore. Light feet, dark violet eyes, and parted hair;
Soft dimpled hands, white neck, and creamy breast Are things on which the dazzled senses rest Till the fond, fixed eyes, forget they stare. From such fine pictures, Heavens! I cannot dare To turn my admiration, though unpossess'd They be of what is worthy, though not drest In lovely modesty, and virtues rare. Yet these I leave as thoughtless as a lark;
These lures I straight forget,- e'en ere I dine, Or thrice my palate moisten: but when I mark Such charms with mild intelligences shine, My ear is open like a greedy shark
To catch the tunings of a voice divine.
Ah! who can e'er forget so fair a being?
Who can forget her half-retiring sweets? God! she is like a milk-white lamb that bleats For man's protection. Surely the All-seeing, Who joys to see us with his gifts agreeing, Will never give him pinions, who entreats Such innocence to ruin,-who vilely cheats A dove-like bosom. In truth, there is no freeing One's thoughts from such a beauty; when I hear A lay that once I saw her hand awake, Her form seems floating palpable, and near: Had I e'er seen her from an arbor take
A dewy flower, oft would that hand appear, And o'er my eyes the trembling moisture shake
My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk, Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk "Tis not through envy of thy happy lot, But being too happy in thy happiness,- That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees In some melodious plot Of beechen green, and shadows numberless Singest of summer in full-throated ease.
O for a draught of vintage, that hath been Cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth, Tasting of Flora and the country-green,
Dance, and Provençal song, and sun-burnt mirth!
O for a beaker full of the warm South, Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene, With beaded bubbles winking at the brim, And purple-stained mouth;
That I might drink, and leave the world unseen, And with thee fade away into the forest dim:
Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget
What thou among the leaves hast never known, The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each other groan; Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs,
Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies; Where but to think is to be full of sorrow And leaden-eyed despairs,
Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes, Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow.
Away! away! for I will fly to thee,
Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards, But on the viewless wings of Poesy,
Though the dull brain perplexes and retards: Already with thee! tender is the night, And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne, Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays; But here there is no light,
Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy
I cannot see what flowers are at my feet, Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs, But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet Wherewith the seasonable month endows The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild; White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine; Fast-fading violets cover'd up in leaves; And mid-May's eldest child,
The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine, The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves.
Darkling I listen; and, for many a time
I have been half in love with easeful Death, Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme, To take into the air my quiet breath;
Now more than ever seems it rich to die, To cease upon the midnight with no pain, While thon art pouring forth thy soul abroad In such an ecstasy!
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vainTo thy high requiem become a sod.
Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird! No hungry generations tread thee down; The voice I hear this passing night was heard In ancient days by emperor and clown:
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,
She stood in tears amid the alien corn; The same that oft-times hath Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam Of perilous seas, in fairy-lands forlorn.
Forlorn! the very word is like a bell
To toll me back from thee to my sole self! Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well As she is famed to do, deceiving elf. Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades Past the near meadows, over the still stream, Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep In the next valley-glades:
Was it a vision, or a waking dream? Fled is that music:-Do I wake or sleep?
THOU still unravish'd bride of quietness! Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time, Sylvan historian, who canst thus express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape Of deities or mortals, or of both,
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy!
Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on; Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd, Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone: Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare; Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss, Though winning near the goal-yet, do not grieve She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss, For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!
Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu; And, happy melodist, unwearied,
For ever piping songs for ever new ;
More happy love! more happy, happy love! For ever warm and still to be enjoy'd,
For ever panting and for ever young; All breathing human passion far above, That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and eloy'd, A burning forehead, and a parching tongue. 4.
Who are these coming to the sacrifice?
To what green altar, O mysterious priest, Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies, And all her silken flanks with garlands drest! What little town by river or sea-shore, Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,
Even into thine own soft-couched ear: Surely I dreamt to-day, or did I see
The winged Psyche with awaken'd eyes!
I wander'd in a forest thoughtlessly,
And, on the sudden, fainting with surprise, Saw two fair creatures, couched side by side In deepest grass, beneath the whisp'ring roof Of leaves and trembled blossoms, where there ran A brooklet, scarce espied:
Mid hush'd, cool-rooted flowers, fragrant-eyed, Blue, silver-white, and budded Tyrian, They lay calm-breathing on the bedded grass; Their arms embraced, and their pinions too; Their lips touch'd not, but had not bade adieu, As if disjoined by soft-handed slumber, And ready still past kisses to outnumber At tender eye-dawn of Aurorean love: The winged boy I knew;
But who wast thou, O happy, happy dove? His Psyche true!
O latest-born and loveliest vision far Of all Olympus' faded hierarchy! Fairer than Phoebe's sapphire-region'd star,
Or Vesper, amorous glow-worm of the sky; Fairer than these, though temple thou hast none, Nor altar heap'd with flowers;
Nor virgin-choir to make delicious moan Upon the midnight hours;
No voice, no lute, no pipe, no incense sweet From chain-swung censer teeming ;
No shrine, no grove, no oracle, no heat Of pale-mouthed prophet dreaming.
O brightest though too late for antique vows, Too, too late for the fond believing lyre, When holy were the haunted forest boughs, Holy the air, the water, and the fire; Yet even in these days so far retired From happy pieties, thy lucent fans, Fluttering among the faint Olympians, I see, and sing, by my own eyes inspired. So let me be thy choir, and make a moan Upon the midnight hours;
Thy voice, thy lute, thy pipe, thy incense sweet From swinged censer teeming; Thy shrine, thy grove, thy oracle, thy heat Of pale-mouth'd prophet dreaming.
Yes, I will be thy priest, and build a fane In some untrodden region of my mind, Where branched thoughts, new-grown with pleasant pain,
Instead of pines shall murmur in the wind Far, far around shall those dark-cluster'd trees
Fledge the wild-ridged mountains steep by steep; And there by zephyrs, streams, and birds, and bees, The moss-lain Dryads shall be lull'd to sleep; And in the midst of this wide quietness A rosy sanctuary will I dress
With the wreathed trellis of a working brain,
With buds, and bells, and stars without a name, With all the gardener Fancy e'er could feign, Who breeding flowers, will never breed the same And there shall be for thee all soft delight That shadowy thought can win,
A bright torch, and a casement ope at night, To let the warm Love in!
EVER let the Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home:
At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,. Like to bubbles when rain pelteth;
Then let winged Fancy wander
Through the thoughts still spread beyond her
Open wide the mind's cage-door,
She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar.
O sweet Fancy' let her loose; Summer's joys are spoilt by use, And the enjoying of the Spring Fades as does its blossoming: Autumn's red-lipp'd fruitage too, Blushing through the mist and dew, Cloys with tasting: What do then? Sit thee by the ingle, when The sear fagot blazes bright, Spirit of a winter's night;
When the soundless earth is muffled, And the caked snow is shuffled From the plowboy's heavy shoon ; When the Night doth meet the Noon In a dark conspiracy
To banish Even from her sky. Sit thee there, and send abroad, With a mind self-overaw'd, Fancy, high commission'd: send her! She has vassals to attend her: She will bring, in spite of frost, Beauties that the earth hath lost; She will bring thee, all together, All delights of summer weather; All the buds and bells of May, From dewy sward or thorny spray; All the heaped Autumn's wealth, With a still, mysterious stealth: She will mix these pleasures up Like three fit wines in a cup,
And thou shalt quaff it-thou shalt hear Distant harvest-carols clear;
Rustle of the reaped corn;
Sweet birds antheming the morn: And, in the same moment-hark! "Tis the early April lark, Or the rooks, with busy caw, Foraging for sticks and straw. Thou shalt, at one glance, behold The daisy and the marigold; White-plumed lilies, and the first Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst; Shaded hyacinth, alway
Sapphire queen of the mid-May; And every leaf, and every flower Pearled with the self-same shower. Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep Meager from its celled sleep; And the snake all winter-thin Cast on sunny bank its skin; Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see Hatching in the hawthorn-tree, When the hen-bird's wing doth rest Quiet on her mossy nest; Then the hurry and alarm When the bee-hive casts its swarm; Acorns ripe down-pattering, While the autumn breezes sing.
O, sweet Fancy! let her loose; Every thing is spoilt by use: Where's the cheek that doth not fade, Too much gazed at? Where's the maid Whose lip mature is ever new? Where's the eye, however blue, Doth not weary? Where's the face One would meet in every place? Where's the voice, however soft, One would hear so very oft?
At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth Like to bubbles when rain pelteth. Let, then, winged Fancy find Thee a mistress to thy mind: Dulcet-eyed as Ceres' daughter, Ere the God of Torment taught her How to frown and how to chide; With a waist and with a side White as Hebe's when her zone
Slipt its golden clasp, and down
Fell her kirtle to her feet,
While she held the goblet sweet,
And Jove grew languid.-Break the mesh Of the Fancy's silken leash; Quickly break her prison-string,
And such joys as these she'll bring.- Let the winged Fancy roam,, Pleasure never is at home.
BARDS of Passion and of Mirth, Ye have left your souls on earth! Have ye souls in heaven too, Double-lived in regions new? Yes, and those of heaven commune With the spheres of sun and moon;
With the noise of fountains wondrous, And the parle of voices thund'rous; With the whisper of heaven's trees And one another, in soft ease Seated on Elysian lawns Browsed by none but Dian's fawns; Underneath large blue-bells tented, Where the daisies are rose-scented, And the rose herself has got Perfume which on earth is not; Where the nightingale doth sing Not a senseless, tranced thing, But divine melodious truth; Philosophic numbers smooth; Tales and golden histories Of heaven and its mysteries.
Thus ye live on high, and then On the earth ye live again; And the souls ye left behind you Teach us, here, the way to find you, Where your other souls are joying, Never slumber'd, never cloying. Here, your earth-born souls still speak To mortals, of their little week; Of their sorrows and delights; Of their passions and their spites, Of their glory and their shame; What doth strengthen and what maim. Thus ye teach us, every day, Wisdom, though fled far away.
Bards of Passion and of Mirth, Ye have left your souls on earth! Ye have souls in heaven too, Double-lived in regions new!
LINES ON THE MERMAID TAVERN
SOULS of poets dead and gone, What Elysium have ye known, Happy field or mossy cavern, Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern? Have ye tippled drink more fine Than mine host's Canary wine? Or are fruits of Paradise Sweeter than those dainty pies Of venison? O generous food! Drest as though bold Robin Hood Would, with his maid Marian, Sup and bowse from horn and can.
I have heard that on a day Mine host's sign-board flew away, Nobody knew whither, till An astrologer's old quill To a sheepskin gave the story,- Said he saw you in your glory, Underneath a new-old sign Sipping beverage divine,
And pledging with contented smack The Mermaid in the Zodiac.
Souls of Poets dead and gone, What Elysium have ye known, Happy field or mossy cavern, Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern?
No! those days are gone away, And their hours are old and gray, And their minutes buried all Under the down-trodden pall Of the leaves of many years: Many times have Winter's shears, Frozen North, and chilling East, Sounded tempests to the feast Of the forest's whispering fleeces, Since men knew nor rent nor leases.
No, the bugle sounds no more, And the twanging bow no more; Silent is the ivory shrill Past the heath and up the hill; There is no mid-forest laugh, Where lone Echo gives the half To some wight, amazed to hear Jesting, deep in forest drear
On the fairest time of June You may go, with sun or moon, Or the seven stars to light you, Or the polar ray to right you; But you never may behold Little John, or Robin bold; Never one, of all the clan, Thrumming on an empty can Some old hunting ditty, while He doth his green way beguil To fair hostess Merriment, Down beside the pasture Trent; For he left the merry tale Messenger for spicy ale.
Gone, the merry morris din; Gone, the song of Gamelyn; Gone, the tough-belted outlaw Idling in the "grené shawe;" All are gone away and past! And if Robin should be cast Sudden from his tufted grave, And if Marian should have Once again her forest days,
She would weep, and he would craze : He would swear, for all his oaks, Fall'n beneath the dock-yard strokes, Have rotted on the briny seas; She would weep that her wild bees Sang not to her-strange! that honey Can't be got without hard money!
So it is; yet let us sing Honor to the old bow-string! Honor to the bugle-horn! Honor to the woods unshorn, Honor to the Lincoln green! Honor to the archer keen! Honor to tight little John, And the horse he rode upon! Honor to bold Robin Hood, Sleeping in the underwood!
Honor to maid Marian,
And to all the Sherwood clan!
Though their days have hurried by, Let us two a burden try.
SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness! Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; Conspiring with him how to load and bless With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run, To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees, And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel-shells With a sweet kernel; to set budding more, And still more, later flowers for the bees, Until they think warm days will never cease, For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store? Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind; Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep, Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers; And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep Steady thy laden head across a brook; Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours. Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they? Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue; Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies; And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft; And gathering swallows twitter in the skies
ODE ON MELANCHOLY.
No, no, go not to Lethe, neither twist
Wolf's-bane, tight-rooted, for its poisonous wine; Nor suffer thy pale forehead to be kiss'd
By nightshade, ruby grape of Proserpine; Make not your rosary of yew-berries,
Nor let the beetle, nor the death-moth be Your mournful Psyche, nor the downy owl
A partner in your sorrow's mysteries; For shade to shade will come too drowsily,' And drown the wakeful anguish of the soul.
But when the melancholy fit shall fall
Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud, That fosters the droop-headed flowers all,
And hides the green hill in an April shroud; Then glut thy sorrow on a morning rose,
Or on the rainbow of the salt sand-wave, Or on the wealth of globed peonies; Or if thy mistress some rich anger shows, Imprison her soft hand, and let her rave, And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes.
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