Poet to Poem

Careful observers may foretell the hour (By sure prognostics) when to dread a shower: While rain depends, the pensive cat gives o'er Her frolics, and pursues her tail no more. Returning home at night, you'll find the sink Strike your offended sense with double stink. If you be wise, then go not far to dine; You'll spend in coach hire more than save in wine. A coming shower your shooting corns presage, Old achès throb, your hollow tooth will rage. Sauntering in coffeehouse is Dulman seen; He damns the climate and complains of spleen. Meanwhile the South, rising with dabbled wings, A sable cloud athwart the welkin flings, That swilled more liquor than it could contain, And, like a drunkard, gives it up again. Brisk Susan whips her linen from the rope, While the first drizzling shower is born aslope: Such is that sprinkling which some careless quean Flirts on you from her mop, but not so clean: You fly, invoke the gods; then turning, stop To rail; she singing, still whirls on her mop. Not yet the dust had shunned the unequal strife, But, aided by the wind, fought still for life, And wafted with its foe by violent gust, 'Twas doubtful which was rain and which was dust. Ah! where must needy poet seek for aid, When dust and rain at once his coat invade? Sole coat, where dust cemented by the rain Erects the nap, and leaves a mingled stain. Now in contiguous drops the flood comes down, Threatening with deluge this devoted town. To shops in crowds the daggled females fly, Pretend to cheapen goods, but nothing buy. The Templar spruce, while every spout's abroach, Stays till 'tis fair, yet seems to call a coach. The tucked-up sempstress walks with hasty strides, While seams run down her oiled umbrella's sides. Here various kinds, by various fortunes led, Commence acquaintance underneath a shed. Triumphant Tories and desponding Whigs Forget their feuds, and join to save their wigs. Boxed in a chair the beau impatient sits, While spouts run clattering o'er the roof by fits, And ever and anon with frightful din The leather sounds; he trembles from within. So when Troy chairmen bore the wooden steed, Pregnant with Greeks impatient to be freed (Those bully Greeks, who, as the moderns do, Instead of paying chairmen, run them through), Laocoön struck the outside with his spear, And each imprisoned hero quaked for fear. Now from all parts the swelling kennels flow, And bear their trophies with them as they go: Filth of all hues and odors seem to tell What street they sailed from, by their sight and smell. They, as each torrent drives with rapid force, From Smithfield or St. Pulchre's shape their course, And in huge confluence joined at Snow Hill ridge, Fall from the conduit prone to Holborn Bridge. Sweepings from butchers' stalls, dung, guts, and blood, Drowned puppies, stinking sprats, all drenched in mud, Dead cats, and turnip tops, come tumbling down the flood.

A Description of a City Shower Jonathan Swift Mock Heroic

I Why will Delia thus retire, And idly languish life away? While the sighing crowd admire, 'Tis too soon for hartshorn tea: II All those dismal looks and fretting Cannot Damon's life restore; Long ago the worms have eat him, You can never see him more. III Once again consult your toilette, In the glass your face review: So much weeping soon will spoil it, And no spring your charms renew. IV I, like you, was born a woman, Well I know what vapors mean: The disease, alas! is common; Single, we have all the spleen. V All the morals that they tell us, Never cured the sorrow yet: Chuse, among the pretty fellows, One of honor, youth, and wit. VI Prithee hear him every morning At least an hour or two; Once again at night returning— I believe the dose will do.

A Receipt to Cure the Vapors Lady Mary Wortley Montagu ?

O my Luve is like a red, red rose That's newly sprung in June; O my Luve is like the melody That's sweetly played in tune. So fair art thou, my bonnie lass, So deep in luve am I; And I will luve thee still, my dear, Till a' the seas gang dry. Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear, And the rocks melt wi' the sun; I will love thee still, my dear, While the sands o' life shall run. And fare thee weel, my only luve! And fare thee weel awhile! And I will come again, my luve, Though it were ten thousand mile.

A Red Red Rose Robert Burns (ballad meter first half, common meter second half) Alternating iambic tetrameter and trimeter

I I weep for Adonais—he is dead! Oh, weep for Adonais! though our tears Thaw not the frost which binds so dear a head! And thou, sad Hour, selected from all years To mourn our loss, rouse thy obscure compeers, And teach them thine own sorrow, say: "With me Died Adonais; till the Future dares Forget the Past, his fate and fame shall be An echo and a light unto eternity!" II Where wert thou, mighty Mother, when he lay, When thy Son lay, pierc'd by the shaft which flies In darkness? where was lorn Urania When Adonais died? With veiled eyes, 'Mid listening Echoes, in her Paradise She sate, while one, with soft enamour'd breath, Rekindled all the fading melodies, With which, like flowers that mock the corse beneath, He had adorn'd and hid the coming bulk of Death.

Adonais (Elegy on the Death of John Keats) Percy Bysshe Shelley

To Belinda on the Rape of the Lock

Alexander Pope Mock Epic

The forward youth that would appear Must now forsake his Muses dear, Nor in the shadows sing His numbers languishing. 'Tis time to leave the books in dust, And oil th' unused armour's rust, Removing from the wall The corslet of the hall. So restless Cromwell could not cease In the inglorious arts of peace, But thorough advent'rous war Urged his active star. And like the three-fork'd lightning, first Breaking the clouds where it was nurst, Did through his own side His fiery way divide. For 'tis all one to courage high, The emulous or enemy; And with such to enclose Is more than to oppose. Then burning through the air he went, And palaces and temples rent; And Cæsar's head at last Did through his laurels blast. 'Tis madness to resist or blame The force of angry Heaven's flame; And, if we would speak true, Much to the man is due, Who from his private gardens where He liv'd reserved and austere, As if his highest plot To plant the bergamot, Could by industrious valour climb To ruin the great work of time, And cast the kingdom old Into another mould. Though justice against fate complain, And plead the ancient rights in vain; But those do hold or break As men are strong or weak. Nature that hateth emptiness Allows of penetration less, And therefore must make room Where greater spirits come. What field of all the civil wars Where his were not the deepest scars? And Hampton shows what part He had of wiser art, Where, twining subtle fears with hope, He wove a net of such a scope That Charles himself might chase To Carisbrooke's narrow case, That thence the royal actor borne The tragic scaffold might adorn, While round the armed bands Did clap their bloody hands. He nothing common did or mean Upon that memorable scene, But with his keener eye The axe's edge did try; Nor call'd the gods with vulgar spite To vindicate his helpless right, But bowed his comely head Down as upon a bed. This was that memorable hour Which first assur'd the forced pow'r. So when they did design The Capitol's first line, A bleeding head, where they begun, Did fright the architects to run; And yet in that the state Foresaw its happy fate. And now the Irish are asham'd To see themselves in one year tam'd; So much one man can do That does both act and know. They can affirm his praises best, And have, though overcome, confest How good he is, how just, And fit for highest trust; Nor yet grown stiffer with command, But still in the republic's hand; How fit he is to sway That can so well obey. He to the Commons' feet presents A kingdom for his first year's rents; And, what he may, forbears His fame, to make it theirs, And has his sword and spoils ungirt, To lay them at the public's skirt. So when the falcon high Falls heavy from the sky, She, having kill'd, no more does search But on the next green bough to perch, Where, when he first does lure, The falc'ner has her sure. What may not then our isle presume While victory his crest does plume! What may not others fear If thus he crown each year! A Cæsar he ere long to Gaul, To Italy an Hannibal, And to all states not free, Shall climacteric be. The Pict no shelter now shall find Within his parti-colour'd mind; But from this valour sad Shrink underneath the plaid, Happy if in the tufted brake The English hunter him mistake, Nor lay his hounds in near The Caledonian deer. But thou, the war's and fortune's son, March indefatigably on; And for the last effect Still keep thy sword erect; Besides the force it has to fright The spirits of the shady night, The same arts that did gain A pow'r, must it maintain.

An Horatian Ode upon Cromwell's Return from Ireland Andrew Marvell Horatian Ode

Storied Sonnet

Ann Radcliffe

Goblin Market

Christina Rosetti

Get up, get up for shame, the Blooming Morne Upon her wings presents the god unshorne. See how Aurora throwes her faire Fresh-quilted colours through the aire: Get up, sweet-Slug-a-bed, and see The Dew-bespangling Herbe and Tree. Each Flower has wept, and bow'd toward the East, Above an houre since; yet you not drest, Nay! not so much as out of bed? When all the Birds have Mattens seyd, And sung their thankful Hymnes: 'tis sin, Nay, profanation to keep in, When as a thousand Virgins on this day, Spring, sooner than the Lark, to fetch in May. Rise; and put on your Foliage, and be seene To come forth, like the Spring-time, fresh and greene; And sweet as Flora. Take no care For Jewels for your Gowne, or Haire: Feare not; the leaves will strew Gemms in abundance upon you: Besides, the childhood of the Day has kept, Against you come, some Orient Pearls unwept: Come, and receive them while the light Hangs on the Dew-locks of the night: And Titan on the Eastern hill Retires himselfe, or else stands still Till you come forth. Wash, dresse, be briefe in praying: Few Beads are best, when once we goe a Maying. Come, my Corinna, come; and comming, marke How each field turns a street; each street a Parke Made green, and trimm'd with trees: see how Devotion gives each House a Bough, Or Branch: Each Porch, each doore, ere this, An Arke a Tabernacle is Made up of white-thorn neatly enterwove; As if here were those cooler shades of love. Can such delights be in the street, And open fields, and we not see't? Come, we'll abroad; and let's obay The Proclamation made for May: And sin no more, as we have done, by staying; But my Corinna, come, let's goe a Maying. There's not a budding Boy, or Girle, this day, But is got up, and gone to bring in May. A deale of Youth, ere this, is come Back, and with White-thorn laden home. Some have dispatcht their Cakes and Creame, Before that we have left to dreame: And some have wept, and woo'd, and plighted Troth, And chose their Priest, ere we can cast off sloth: Many a green-gown has been given; Many a kisse, both odde and even: Many a glance too has been sent From out the eye, Loves Firmament: Many a jest told of the Keyes betraying This night, and Locks pickt, yet w'are not a Maying. Come, let us goe, while we are in our prime; And take the harmlesse follie of the time. We shall grow old apace, and die Before we know our liberty. Our life is short; and our dayes run As fast away as do's the Sunne: And as a vapour, or a drop of raine Once lost, can ne'r be found againe: So when or you or I are made A fable, song, or fleeting shade; All love, all liking, all delight Lies drown'd with us in endlesse night. Then while time serves, and we are but decaying; Come, my Corinna, come, let's goe a Maying.

Corinna's Going a-Maying Robert Herrick Mock Epic?

I Well! If the Bard was weather-wise, who made The grand old ballad of Sir Patrick Spence, This night, so tranquil now, will not go hence Unroused by winds, that ply a busier trade Than those which mould yon cloud in lazy flakes, Or the dull sobbing draft, that moans and rakes Upon the strings of this Æolian lute, Which better far were mute. For lo! the New-moon winter-bright! And overspread with phantom light, (With swimming phantom light o'erspread But rimmed and circled by a silver thread) I see the old Moon in her lap, foretelling The coming-on of rain and squally blast. And oh! that even now the gust were swelling, And the slant night-shower driving loud and fast! Those sounds which oft have raised me, whilst they awed, And sent my soul abroad, Might now perhaps their wonted impulse give, Might startle this dull pain, and make it move and live! II A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear, A stifled, drowsy, unimpassioned grief, Which finds no natural outlet, no relief, In word, or sigh, or tear— O Lady! in this wan and heartless mood, To other thoughts by yonder throstle woo'd, All this long eve, so balmy and serene, Have I been gazing on the western sky, And its peculiar tint of yellow green: And still I gaze—and with how blank an eye! And those thin clouds above, in flakes and bars, That give away their motion to the stars; Those stars, that glide behind them or between, Now sparkling, now bedimmed, but always seen: Yon crescent Moon, as fixed as if it grew In its own cloudless, starless lake of blue; I see them all so excellently fair, I see, not feel, how beautiful they are! III My genial spirits fail; And what can these avail To lift the smothering weight from off my breast? It were a vain endeavour, Though I should gaze for ever On that green light that lingers in the west: I may not hope from outward forms to win The passion and the life, whose fountains are within. IV O Lady! we receive but what we give, And in our life alone does Nature live: Ours is her wedding garment, ours her shroud! And would we aught behold, of higher worth, Than that inanimate cold world allowed To the poor loveless ever-anxious crowd, Ah! from the soul itself must issue forth A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud Enveloping the Earth— And from the soul itself must there be sent A sweet and potent voice, of its own birth, Of all sweet sounds the life and element! V O pure of heart! thou need'st not ask of me What this strong music in the soul may be! What, and wherein it doth exist, This light, this glory, this fair luminous mist, This beautiful and beauty-making power. Joy, virtuous Lady! Joy that ne'er was given, Save to the pure, and in their purest hour, Life, and Life's effluence, cloud at once and shower, Joy, Lady! is the spirit and the power, Which wedding Nature to us gives in dower A new Earth and new Heaven, Undreamt of by the sensual and the proud— Joy is the sweet voice, Joy the luminous cloud— We in ourselves rejoice! And thence flows all that charms or ear or sight, All melodies the echoes of that voice, All colours a suffusion from that light. VI There was a time when, though my path was rough, This joy within me dallied with distress, And all misfortunes were but as the stuff Whence Fancy made me dreams of happiness: For hope grew round me, like the twining vine, And fruits, and foliage, not my own, seemed mine. But now afflictions bow me down to earth: Nor care I that they rob me of my mirth; But oh! each visitation Suspends what nature gave me at my birth, My shaping spirit of Imagination. For not to think of what I needs must feel, But to be still and patient, all I can; And haply by abstruse research to steal From my own nature all the natural man— This was my sole resource, my only plan: Till that which suits a part infects the whole, And now is almost grown the habit of my soul. VII Hence, viper thoughts, that coil around my mind, Reality's dark dream! I turn from you, and listen to the wind, Which long has raved unnoticed. What a scream Of agony by torture lengthened out That lute sent forth! Thou Wind, that rav'st without, Bare crag, or mountain-tairn, or blasted tree, Or pine-grove whither woodman never clomb, Or lonely house, long held the witches' home, Methinks were fitter instruments for thee, Mad Lutanist! who in this month of showers, Of dark-brown gardens, and of peeping flowers, Mak'st Devils' yule, with worse than wintry song, The blossoms, buds, and timorous leaves among. Thou Actor, perfect in all tragic sounds! Thou mighty Poet, e'en to frenzy bold! What tell'st thou now about? 'Tis of the rushing of an host in rout, With groans, of trampled men, with smarting wounds— At once they groan with pain, and shudder with the cold! But hush! there is a pause of deepest silence! And all that noise, as of a rushing crowd, With groans, and tremulous shudderings—all is over— It tells another tale, with sounds less deep and loud! A tale of less affright, And tempered with delight, As Otway's self had framed the tender lay,— 'Tis of a little child Upon a lonesome wild, Nor far from home, but she hath lost her way: And now moans low in bitter grief and fear, And now screams loud, and hopes to make her mother hear. VIII 'Tis midnight, but small thoughts have I of sleep: Full seldom may my friend such vigils keep! Visit her, gentle Sleep! with wings of healing, And may this storm be but a mountain-birth, May all the stars hang bright above her dwelling, Silent as though they watched the sleeping Earth! With light heart may she rise, Gay fancy, cheerful eyes, Joy lift her spirit, joy attune her voice; To her may all things live, from pole to pole, Their life the eddying of her living soul! O simple spirit, guided from above, Dear Lady! friend devoutest of my choice, Thus mayest thou ever, evermore rejoice.

Dejection: An Ode Samuel Taylor Coleridge (Ode)

selection from A Philosophical Enquiry into our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful

Edmund Burke

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day, The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea, The plowman homeward plods his weary way, And leaves the world to darkness and to me. Now fades the glimm'ring landscape on the sight, And all the air a solemn stillness holds, Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight, And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds; Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r The moping owl does to the moon complain Of such, as wand'ring near her secret bow'r, Molest her ancient solitary reign. Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade, Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap, Each in his narrow cell for ever laid, The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn, The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed, The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn, No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed. For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn, Or busy housewife ply her evening care: No children run to lisp their sire's return, Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share. Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield, Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke; How jocund did they drive their team afield! How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke! Let not Ambition mock their useful toil, Their homely joys, and destiny obscure; Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile The short and simple annals of the poor. The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r, And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, Awaits alike th' inevitable hour. The paths of glory lead but to the grave. Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault, If Mem'ry o'er their tomb no trophies raise, Where thro' the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault The pealing anthem swells the note of praise. Can storied urn or animated bust Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath? Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust, Or Flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death? Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire; Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway'd, Or wak'd to ecstasy the living lyre. But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll; Chill Penury repress'd their noble rage, And froze the genial current of the soul. Full many a gem of purest ray serene, The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear: Full many a flow'r is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air. Some village-Hampden, that with dauntless breast The little tyrant of his fields withstood; Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest, Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood. Th' applause of list'ning senates to command, The threats of pain and ruin to despise, To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, And read their hist'ry in a nation's eyes, Their lot forbade: nor circumscrib'd alone Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin'd; Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne, And shut the gates of mercy on mankind, The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide, To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame, Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride With incense kindled at the Muse's flame. Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife, Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray; Along the cool sequester'd vale of life They kept the noiseless tenor of their way. Yet ev'n these bones from insult to protect, Some frail memorial still erected nigh, With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck'd, Implores the passing tribute of a sigh. Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd muse, The place of fame and elegy supply: And many a holy text around she strews, That teach the rustic moralist to die. For who to dumb Forgetfulness a prey, This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd, Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, Nor cast one longing, ling'ring look behind? On some fond breast the parting soul relies, Some pious drops the closing eye requires; Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries, Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fires. For thee, who mindful of th' unhonour'd Dead Dost in these lines their artless tale relate; If chance, by lonely contemplation led, Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate, Haply some hoary-headed swain may say, "Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn Brushing with hasty steps the dews away To meet the sun upon the upland lawn. "There at the foot of yonder nodding beech That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high, His listless length at noontide would he stretch, And pore upon the brook that babbles by. "Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn, Mutt'ring his wayward fancies he would rove, Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn, Or craz'd with care, or cross'd in hopeless love. "One morn I miss'd him on the custom'd hill, Along the heath and near his fav'rite tree; Another came; nor yet beside the rill, Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he; "The next with dirges due in sad array Slow thro' the church-way path we saw him borne. Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay, Grav'd on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."

Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard Thomas Gray Pastoral elegy

What on Earth deserves our trust? Youth and Beauty both are dust. Long we gathering are with pain, What one moment calls again. Seven years childless marriage past, A Son, a son is born at last: So exactly lim'd and fair, Full of good Spirits, Meen, and Air, As a long life promised, Yet, in less than six weeks dead. Too promising, too great a mind In so small room to be confined: Therefore, as fit in Heaven to dwell, He quickly broke the Prison shell. So the subtle Alchemist, Can't with Hermes Seal resist The powerful spirit's subtler flight, But t'will bid him long good night. And so the Sun if it arise Half so glorious as his Eyes, Like this Infant, takes a shrowd, Buried in a morning Cloud.

Epitaph Katherine Philips

selections from The Illiad and The Odyssey

Homer

A sudden blow: the great wings beating still Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill, He holds her helpless breast upon his breast. How can those terrified vague fingers push The feathered glory from her loosening thighs? And how can body, laid in that white rush, But feel the strange heart beating where it lies? A shudder in the loins engenders there The broken wall, the burning roof and tower And Agamemnon dead. Being so caught up, So mastered by the brute blood of the air, Did she put on his knowledge with his power Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?

Leda and the Swan W. B. Yeats

The Factory

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Strong Son of God, immortal Love, Whom we, that have not seen thy face, By faith, and faith alone, embrace, Believing where we cannot prove; Thine are these orbs of light and shade; Thou madest Life in man and brute; Thou madest Death; and lo, thy foot Is on the skull which thou hast made. Thou wilt not leave us in the dust: Thou madest man, he knows not why, He thinks he was not made to die; And thou hast made him: thou art just. Thou seemest human and divine, The highest, holiest manhood, thou. Our wills are ours, we know not how; Our wills are ours, to make them thine....

In Memoriam Alfred, Lord Tennyson

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea. So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round; And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills, Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree; And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover! A savage place! as holy and enchanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman wailing for her demon-lover! And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, A mighty fountain momently was forced: Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail: And mid these dancing rocks at once and ever It flung up momently the sacred river. Five miles meandering with a mazy motion Through wood and dale the sacred river ran, Then reached the caverns measureless to man, And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean; And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far Ancestral voices prophesying war! The shadow of the dome of pleasure Floated midway on the waves; Where was heard the mingled measure From the fountain and the caves. It was a miracle of rare device, A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice! A damsel with a dulcimer In a vision once I saw: It was an Abyssinian maid And on her dulcimer she played, Singing of Mount Abora. Could I revive within me Her symphony and song, To such a deep delight 'twould win me, That with music loud and long, I would build that dome in air, That sunny dome! those caves of ice! And all who heard should see them there, And all should cry, Beware! Beware! His flashing eyes, his floating hair! Weave a circle round him thrice, And close your eyes with holy dread For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise.

Kubla Khan Samuel Coleridge

Epistle form Mrs Yonge to Her Hustband

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

The Reasons that Induced Dr. S to write a Poem

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

Five years have past; five summers, with the length Of five long winters! and again I hear These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs With a soft inland murmur.—Once again Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs, That on a wild secluded scene impress Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect The landscape with the quiet of the sky. The day is come when I again repose Here, under this dark sycamore, and view These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts, Which at this season, with their unripe fruits, Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves 'Mid groves and copses. Once again I see These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines Of sportive wood run wild: these pastoral farms, Green to the very door; and wreaths of smoke Sent up, in silence, from among the trees! With some uncertain notice, as might seem Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods, Or of some Hermit's cave, where by his fire The Hermit sits alone. These beauteous forms, Through a long absence, have not been to me As is a landscape to a blind man's eye: But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart; And passing even into my purer mind With tranquil restoration:—feelings too Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps, As have no slight or trivial influence On that best portion of a good man's life, His little, nameless, unremembered, acts Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust, To them I may have owed another gift, Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood, In which the burthen of the mystery, In which the heavy and the weary weight Of all this unintelligible world, Is lightened:—that serene and blessed mood, In which the affections gently lead us on,— Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul: While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things. If this Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft— In darkness and amid the many shapes Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, Have hung upon the beatings of my heart— How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee, O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods, How often has my spirit turned to thee! And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought, With many recognitions dim and faint, And somewhat of a sad perplexity, The picture of the mind revives again: While here I stand, not only with the sense Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts That in this moment there is life and food For future years. And so I dare to hope, Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first I came among these hills; when like a roe I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, Wherever nature led: more like a man Flying from something that he dreads, than one Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then (The coarser pleasures of my boyish days And their glad animal movements all gone by) To me was all in all.—I cannot paint What then I was. The sounding cataract Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock, The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood, Their colours and their forms, were then to me An appetite; a feeling and a love, That had no need of a remoter charm, By thought supplied, not any interest Unborrowed from the eye.—That time is past, And all its aching joys are now no more, And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur; other gifts Have followed; for such loss, I would believe, Abundant recompense. For I have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue.—And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man: A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still A lover of the meadows and the woods And mountains; and of all that we behold From this green earth; of all the mighty world Of eye, and ear,—both what they half create, And what perceive; well pleased to recognise In nature and the language of the sense The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul Of all my moral being. Nor perchance, If I were not thus taught, should I the more Suffer my genial spirits to decay: For thou art with me here upon the banks Of this fair river; thou my dearest Friend, My dear, dear Friend; and in thy voice I catch The language of my former heart, and read My former pleasures in the shooting lights Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little while May I behold in thee what I was once, My dear, dear Sister! and this prayer I make, Knowing that Nature never did betray The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege, Through all the years of this our life, to lead From joy to joy: for she can so inform The mind that is within us, so impress With quietness and beauty, and so feed With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues, Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men, Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all The dreary intercourse of daily life, Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb Our cheerful faith, that all which we behold Is full of blessings. Therefore let the moon Shine on thee in thy solitary walk; And let the misty mountain-winds be free To blow against thee: and, in after years, When these wild ecstasies shall be matured Into a sober pleasure; when thy mind Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms, Thy memory be as a dwelling-place For all sweet sounds and harmonies; oh! then, If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief, Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts Of tender joy wilt thou remember me, And these my exhortations! Nor, perchance— If I should be where I no more can hear Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these gleams Of past existence—wilt thou then forget That on the banks of this delightful stream We stood together; and that I, so long A worshipper of Nature, hither came Unwearied in that service: rather say With warmer love—oh! with far deeper zeal Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget, That after many wanderings, many years Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs, And this green pastoral landscape, were to me More dear, both for themselves and for thy sake!

Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey William Wordsworth

I wander thro' each charter'd street, Near where the charter'd Thames does flow. And mark in every face I meet Marks of weakness, marks of woe. In every cry of every Man, In every Infants cry of fear, In every voice: in every ban, The mind-forg'd manacles I hear How the Chimney-sweepers cry Every blackning Church appalls, And the hapless Soldiers sigh Runs in blood down Palace walls But most thro' midnight streets I hear How the youthful Harlots curse Blasts the new-born Infants tear And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse

London William Blake Ballad

Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere, I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude, And with forc'd fingers rude Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year. Bitter constraint and sad occasion dear Compels me to disturb your season due; For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime, Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer. Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme. He must not float upon his wat'ry bier Unwept, and welter to the parching wind, Without the meed of some melodious tear.

Lycidas John Milton

To the Poet Coleridge

Mary Robinson

Selection from Sappho and Phaon

Mary Robinson Sonnets

Paradise Lost

Milton

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, Emprison her soft hand, and let her rave, And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes. She dwells with Beauty—Beauty that must die; And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips Bidding adieu; and aching Pleasure nigh, Turning to poison while the bee-mouth sips: Ay, in the very temple of Delight Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine, Though seen of none save him whose strenuous tongue Can burst Joy's grape against his palate fine; His soul shalt taste the sadness of her might, And be among her cloudy trophies hung.

Ode on Melancholy John Keats Ode

'Twas on a lofty vase's side, Where China's gayest art had dyed The azure flowers that blow; Demurest of the tabby kind, The pensive Selima, reclined, Gazed on the lake below. Her conscious tail her joy declared; The fair round face, the snowy beard, The velvet of her paws, Her coat, that with the tortoise vies, Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes, She saw; and purred applause. Still had she gazed; but 'midst the tide Two angel forms were seen to glide, The genii of the stream; Their scaly armour's Tyrian hue Through richest purple to the view Betrayed a golden gleam. The hapless nymph with wonder saw; A whisker first and then a claw, With many an ardent wish, She stretched in vain to reach the prize. What female heart can gold despise? What cat's averse to fish? Presumptuous maid! with looks intent Again she stretch'd, again she bent, Nor knew the gulf between. (Malignant Fate sat by, and smiled) The slippery verge her feet beguiled, She tumbled headlong in. Eight times emerging from the flood She mewed to every watery god, Some speedy aid to send. No dolphin came, no Nereid stirred; Nor cruel Tom, nor Susan heard; A Favourite has no friend! From hence, ye beauties, undeceived, Know, one false step is ne'er retrieved, And be with caution bold. Not all that tempts your wandering eyes And heedless hearts, is lawful prize; Nor all that glisters, gold.

Ode on the Death of a Favorite Cat Drowned in a Tub of Goldfishes Thomas Gray (Ode)

I As once, if not with light regard I read aright that gifted bard (Him whose school above the rest His loveliest Elfin Queen has blest), One, only one unrivaled fair Might hope the magic girdle wear, At solemn tourney hung on high, The wish of each love-darting eye; Lo! to each other nymph in turn applied, As if, in air unseen, some hov'ring hand, Some chaste and angel-friend to virgin-fame, With whispered spell had burst the starting band, It left unblessed her loathed dishonoured side; Happier, hopeless fair, if never Her baffled hand with vain endeavour Had touched that fatal zone to her denied! Young Fancy thus, to me divinest name, To whom, prepared and bathed in Heav'n, The cest of amplest power is giv'n, To few the godlike gift assigns, To gird their blessed, prophetic loins, And gaze her visions wild, and feel unmixed her flame! II The band, as fairy legends say, Was wove on that creating day, When He, who called with thought to birth Yon tented sky, this laughing earth, And dressed with springs, and forests tall, And poured the main engirting all, Long by the loved enthusiast wooed, Himself in some diviner mood, Retiring, sate with her alone, And placed her on his sapphire throne; The whiles, the vaulted shrine around, Seraphic wires were heard to sound; Now sublimest triumph swelling, Now on love and mercy dwelling; And she, from out the veiling cloud, Breathed her magic notes aloud: And thou, thou rich-haired youth of morn, And all thy subject life was born! The dang'rous Passions kept aloof, Far from the sainted growing woof; But near it sate ecstatic Wonder, List'ning the deep applauding thunder; And Truth, in sunny vest arrayed, By whose the tarsel's eyes were made; All the shad'wy tribes of Mind, In braided dance their murmurs joined; And all the bright uncounted powers Who feed on Heav'n's ambrosial flowers. Where is the bard, whose soul can now Its high presuming hopes avow? Where he who thinks, with rapture blind, This hallowed work for him designed? III High on some cliff, to Heav'n up-piled, Of rude access, of prospect wild, Where, tangled round the jealous steep, Strange shades o'erbrow the valleys deep, And holy Genii guard the rock, Its glooms embrown, its springs unlock, While on its rich ambitious head, An Eden, like his own, lies spread: I view that oak the fancied glades among, By which as Milton lay, his evening ear, From many a cloud that dropped ethereal dew, Nigh sphered in Heav'n its native strains could hear: On which that ancient trump he reached was hung; Thither oft, his glory greeting, From Waller's myrtle shades retreating, With many a vow from Hope's aspiring tongue, My trembling feet his guiding steps pursue; In vain— such bliss to one alone Of all the sons of soul was known, And Heav'n and Fancy, kindred powers, Have now o'erturn'd th'inspiring bowers, Or curtained close such scene from every future view.

Ode on the Poetical Character William Collins (Pindaric ode)

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 thine 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 sunburnt 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 ways. 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 thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad In such an ecstasy! Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain— To 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 faery 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 fam'd 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?

Ode to a Nightingale John Keats (Ode)

I O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing, Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou, Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low, Each like a corpse within its grave, until Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill (Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air) With living hues and odours plain and hill: Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere; Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh hear! II Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky's commotion, Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed, Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean, Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread On the blue surface of thine aëry surge, Like the bright hair uplifted from the head Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge Of the horizon to the zenith's height, The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge Of the dying year, to which this closing night Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre, Vaulted with all thy congregated might Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh hear! III Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams, Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay, And saw in sleep old palaces and towers Quivering within the wave's intenser day, All overgrown with azure moss and flowers So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou For whose path the Atlantic's level powers Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear The sapless foliage of the ocean, know Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear, And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear! IV If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear; If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee; A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share The impulse of thy strength, only less free Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even I were as in my boyhood, and could be The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven, As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed Scarce seem'd a vision; I would ne'er have striven As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need. Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud! I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed! A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bow'd One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud. V Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is: What if my leaves are falling like its own! The tumult of thy mighty harmonies Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone, Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce, My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one! Drive my dead thoughts over the universe Like wither'd leaves to quicken a new birth! And, by the incantation of this verse, Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind! Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind, If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

Ode to the West Wind Percy Bysshe Shelley (Ode)

If by dull rhymes our English must be chain'd, And, like Andromeda, the sonnet sweet Fetter'd, in spite of painéd loveliness; Let us find out, if we must be constrain'd, Sandals more interwoven and complete To fit the naked foot of Poesy; Let us inspect the lyre, and weigh the stress Of every chord, and see what may be gain'd By ear industrious, and attention meet; Misers of sound and syllable, no less Than Midas of his coinage, let us be Jealous of dead leaves in the bay wreath crown; So, if we may not let the Muse be free, She will be bound with garlands of her own.

On the Sonnet John Keats (Sonnet)

The rain set early in to-night, The sullen wind was soon awake, It tore the elm-tops down for spite, And did its worst to vex the lake: I listened with heart fit to break. When glided in Porphyria; straight She shut the cold out and the storm, And kneeled and made the cheerless grate Blaze up, and all the cottage warm; Which done, she rose, and from her form Withdrew the dripping cloak and shawl, And laid her soiled gloves by, untied Her hat and let the damp hair fall, And, last, she sat down by my side And called me. When no voice replied, She put my arm about her waist, And made her smooth white shoulder bare, And all her yellow hair displaced, And, stooping, made my cheek lie there, And spread, o'er all, her yellow hair, Murmuring how she loved me — she Too weak, for all her heart's endeavour, To set its struggling passion free From pride, and vainer ties dissever, And give herself to me for ever. But passion sometimes would prevail, Nor could to-night's gay feast restrain A sudden thought of one so pale For love of her, and all in vain: So, she was come through wind and rain. Be sure I looked up at her eyes Happy and proud; at last I knew Porphyria worshipped me; surprise Made my heart swell, and still it grew While I debated what to do. That moment she was mine, mine, fair, Perfectly pure and good: I found A thing to do, and all her hair In one long yellow string I wound Three times her little throat around, And strangled her. No pain felt she; I am quite sure she felt no pain. As a shut bud that holds a bee, I warily oped her lids: again Laughed the blue eyes without a stain. And I untightened next the tress About her neck; her cheek once more Blushed bright beneath my burning kiss: I propped her head up as before, Only, this time my shoulder bore Her head, which droops upon it still: The smiling rosy little head, So glad it has its utmost will, That all it scorned at once is fled, And I, its love, am gained instead! Porphyria's love: she guessed not how Her darling one wish would be heard. And thus we sit together now, And all night long we have not stirred, And yet God has not said a word!

Porphyria's Lover Robert Browning

She dwelt among the untrodden ways Beside the springs of Dove, A Maid whom there were none to praise And very few to love: A violet by a mossy stone Half hidden from the eye! —Fair as a star, when only one Is shining in the sky. She lived unknown, and few could know When Lucy ceased to be; But she is in her grave, and, oh, The difference to me!

She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways William Wordsworth

Christabel

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

FLAVIA. THE wretched FLAVIA on her couch reclin'd, Thus breath'd the anguish of a wounded mind ; A glass revers'd in her right hand she bore, For now she shun'd the face she sought before. ' How am I chang'd ! alas ! how am I grown ' A frightful spectre, to myself unknown ! ' Where's my Complexion ? where the radiant Bloom, ' That promis'd happiness for Years to come ? ' Then with what pleasure I this face survey'd ! ' To look once more, my visits oft delay'd ! ' Charm'd with the view, a fresher red would rise, ' And a new life shot sparkling from my eyes ! ' Ah ! faithless glass, my wonted bloom restore; ' Alas ! I rave, that bloom is now no more ! ' The greatest good the GODS on men bestow, ' Ev'n youth itself, to me is useless now. ' There was a time, (oh ! that I could forget !) ' When opera-tickets pour'd before my feet ; ' And at the ring, where brightest beauties shine, ' The earliest cherries of the spring were mine. ' Witness, O Lilly ; and thou, Motteux, tell ' How much Japan these eyes have made ye sell. ' With what contempt ye you saw me oft despise ' The humble offer of the raffled prize ; ' For at the raffle still the prize I bore, ' With scorn rejected, or with triumph wore ! ' Now beauty's fled, and presents are no more ! ' For me the Patriot has the house forsook, ' And left debates to catch a passing look : ' For me the Soldier has soft verses writ ; ' For me the Beau has aim'd to be a Wit. ' For me the Wit to nonsense was betray'd ; ' The Gamester has for me his dun delay'd, ' And overseen the card, I would have play'd. ' The bold and haughty by success made vain, ' Aw'd by my eyes has trembled to complain: ' The bashful 'squire touch'd by a wish unknown, ' Has dar'd to speak with spirit not his own ; ' Fir'd by one wish, all did alike adore ; ' Now beauty's fled, and lovers are no more! ' As round the room I turn my weeping eyes, ' New unaffected scenes of sorrow rise ! ' Far from my sight that killing picture bear, ' The face disfigure, and the canvas tear ! ' That picture which with pride I us'd to show, ' The lost resemblance but upbraids me now. ' And thou, my toilette! where I oft have sat, ' While hours unheeded pass'd in deep debate, ' How curls should fall, or where a patch to place : ' If blue or scarlet best became my face; ' Now on some happier nymph thy aid bestow ; ' On fairer heads, ye useless jewels glow ! ' No borrow'd lustre can my charms restore ; ' Beauty is fled, and dress is now no more ! ' Ye meaner beauties, I permit ye shine ; ' Go, triumph in the hearts that once were mine ; ' But midst your triumphs with confusion know, ' 'Tis to my ruin all your arms ye owe. ' Would pitying Heav'n restore my wonted mien, ' Ye still might move unthought-of and unseen. ' But oh ! how vain, how wretched is the boast ' Of beauty faded, and of empire lost ! ' What now is left but weeping, to deplore ' My beauty fled, and empire now no more ! ' Ye, cruel Chymists, what with-held your aid ! ' Could no pomatums save a trembling maid ? ' How false and trifling is that art you boast ; ' No art can give me back my beauty lost. ' In tears, surrounded by my friends I lay, ' Mask'd o'er and trembled at the sight of day; ' MIRMILLO came my fortune to deplore, ' (A golden headed cane, well carv'd he bore) ' Cordials, he cried, my spirits must restore : ' Beauty is fled, and spirit is no more ! ' GALEN, the grave ; officious SQUIRT was there, ' With fruitless grief and unavailing care : ' MACHAON too, the great MACHAON, known ' By his red cloak and his superior frown ; ' And why, he cry'd, this grief and this despair ? ' You shall again be well, again be fair ; ' Believe my oath ; (with that an oath he swore) ' False was his oath ; my beauty is no more ! ' Cease, hapless maid, no more thy tale pursue, ' Forsake mankind, and bid the world adieu ! ' Monarchs and beauties rule with equal sway ; ' All strive to serve, and glory to obey : ' Alike unpitied when depos'd they grow ; ' Men mock the idol of their former vow. ' Adieu ! ye parks ! — in some obscure recess, ' Where gentle streams will weep at my distress, ' Where no false friend will in my grief take part, ' And mourn my ruin with a joyful heart ; ' There let me live in some deserted place, ' There hide in shades this lost inglorious face. ' Ye, operas, circles, I no more must view ! ' My toilette, patches, all the world adieu!

Saturday (The Smallpox) Lady Mary Wortley Montagu Town eclogue, iambic pentameter Heroic couplets

Scorn not the Sonnet; Critic, you have frowned, Mindless of its just honours; with this key Shakespeare unlocked his heart; the melody Of this small lute gave ease to Petrarch's wound; A thousand times this pipe did Tasso sound; With it Camöens soothed an exile's grief; The Sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf Amid the cypress with which Dante crowned His visionary brow: a glow-worm lamp, It cheered mild Spenser, called from Faery-land To struggle through dark ways; and, when a damp Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand The Thing became a trumpet; whence he blew Soul-animating strains—alas, too few!

Scorn not the Sonnet William Wordsworth (Sonnet)

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd; But thy eternal summer shall not fade Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st; Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st; So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Sonnet 18 William Shakespeare (Sonnet)

No longer mourn for me when I am dead Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell Give warning to the world that I am fled From this vile world with vildest worms to dwell: Nay, if you read this line, remember not The hand that writ it, for I love you so That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot, If thinking on me then should make you woe. O if, I say, you look upon this verse When I perhaps compounded am with clay, Do not so much as my poor name rehearse, But let your love even with my life decay, Lest the wise world should look into your moan And mock you with me after I am gone.

Sonnet 71 William Shakespeare (Sonnet)

How like a winter hath my absence been From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year! What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen! What old December's bareness everywhere! And yet this time removed was summer's time, The teeming autumn big with rich increase, Bearing the wanton burthen of the prime, Like widowed wombs after their lords' decease. Yet this abundant issue seemed to me But hope of orphans, and unfathered fruit. For summer and his pleasures wait on thee, And thou away, the very birds are mute. Or if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near.

Sonnet 97 William Shakespeare (Sonnet)

I thought once how Theocritus had sung Of the sweet years, the dear and wished for years, Who each one in a gracious hand appears To bear a gift for mortals, old or young: And, as I mused it in his antique tongue, I saw, in gradual vision through my tears, The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years, Those of my own life, who by turns had flung A shadow across me. Straightway I was 'ware, So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair, And a voice said in mastery, while I strove, ... Guess now who holds thee?'—Death,' I said. But there, The silver answer rang ... Not Death, but Love.'

Sonnets from the Portuguese #1 Elizabeth Barrett Browning Sonnet

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight For the ends of being and ideal grace. I love thee to the level of every day's Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. I love thee freely, as men strive for right; I love thee purely, as they turn from praise. I love thee with the passion put to use In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death.

Sonnets from the Portuguese #43 Elizabeth Barrett Browning Sonnet

Sweet Auburn, loveliest village of the plain, Where health and plenty cheared the labouring swain, Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid, And parting summer's lingering blooms delayed, Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease, Seats of my youth, when every sport could please, How often have I loitered o'er thy green, Where humble happiness endeared each scene! How often have I paused on every charm, The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm, The never-failing brook, the busy mill, The decent church that topt the neighbouring hill, The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade, For talking age and whispering lovers made! How often have I blest the coming day, When toil remitting lent its turn to play, And all the village train, from labour free, Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree, While many a pastime circled in the shade, The young contending as the old surveyed; And many a gambol frolicked o'er the ground, And slights of art and feats of strength went round; And still as each repeated pleasure tired, Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired; The dancing pair that simply sought renown By holding out to tire each other down; The swain mistrustless of his smutted face, While secret laughter tittered round the place; The bashful virgin's side-long looks of love, The matron's glance that would those looks reprove! These were thy charms, sweet village; sports like these, With sweet succession, taught even toil to please; These round thy bowers their chearful influence shed, These were thy charms—But all these charms are fled. Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn, Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn; Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen, And desolation saddens all thy green: One only master grasps the whole domain, And half a tillage stints thy smiling plain; No more thy glassy brook reflects the day, But, choaked with sedges, works its weedy way; Along thy glades, a solitary guest, The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest; Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies, And tires their echoes with unvaried cries. Sunk are thy bowers, in shapeless ruin all, And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall; And, trembling, shrinking from the spoiler's hand, Far, far away, thy children leave the land. Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, Where wealth accumulates, and men decay: Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade; A breath can make them, as a breath has made; But a bold peasantry, their country's pride, When once destroyed, can never be supplied. A time there was, ere England's griefs began, When every rood of ground maintained its man; For him light labour spread her wholesome store, Just gave what life required, but gave no more: His best companions, innocence and health; And his best riches, ignorance of wealth. But times are altered; trade's unfeeling train Usurp the land and dispossess the swain; Along the lawn, where scattered hamlets rose, Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose; And every want to oppulence allied, And every pang that folly pays to pride. Those gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom, Those calm desires that asked but little room, Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful scene, Lived in each look, and brightened all the green; These, far departing seek a kinder shore, And rural mirth and manners are no more. Sweet Auburn! parent of the blissful hour, Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power. Here as I take my solitary rounds, Amidst thy tangling walks, and ruined grounds, And, many a year elapsed, return to view Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew, Remembrance wakes with all her busy train, Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain. In all my wanderings round this world of care, In all my griefs—and God has given my share— I still had hopes, my latest hours to crown, Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down; To husband out life's taper at the close, And keep the flame from wasting by repose. I still had hopes, for pride attends us still, Amidst the swains to shew my book-learned skill, Around my fire an evening groupe to draw, And tell of all I felt, and all I saw; And, as an hare whom hounds and horns pursue, Pants to the place from whence at first she flew, I still had hopes, my long vexations past, Here to return—and die at home at last. O blest retirement, friend to life's decline, Retreats from care that never must be mine, How happy he who crowns, in shades like these A youth of labour with an age of ease; Who quits a world where strong temptations try, And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly! For him no wretches, born to work and weep, Explore the mine, or tempt the dangerous deep; No surly porter stands in guilty state To spurn imploring famine from the gate, But on he moves to meet his latter end, Angels around befriending virtue's friend; Bends to the grave with unperceived decay, While resignation gently slopes the way; And, all his prospects brightening to the last, His Heaven commences ere the world be past! Sweet was the sound, when oft at evening's close, Up yonder hill the village murmur rose; There, as I past with careless steps and slow, The mingling notes came soften'd from below; The swain responsive as the milk-maid sung, The sober herd that lowed to meet their young, The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool, The playful children just let loose from school, The watch-dog's voice that bayed the whispering wind, And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind, These all in sweet confusion sought the shade, And filled each pause the nightingale had made. But now the sounds of population fail, No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale, No busy steps the grass-grown foot-way tread, For all the bloomy flush of life is fled. All but yon widowed, solitary thing That feebly bends beside the plashy spring; She, wretched matron, forced in age, for bread, To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread, To pick her wintry ****** from the thorn, To seek her nightly shed, and weep till morn; She only left of all the harmless train, The sad historian of the pensive plain. Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled, And still where many a garden-flower grows wild; There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose, The village preacher's modest mansion rose. A man he was, to all the country dear, And passing rich with forty pounds a year; Remote from towns he ran his godly race, Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change his place; Unpractised he to fawn, or seek for power, By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour; Far other aims his heart had learned to prize, More skilled to raise the wretched than to rise. His house was known to all the vagrant train, He chid their wanderings but relieved their pain; The long-remembered beggar was his guest, Whose beard descending swept his aged breast; The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud, Claim'd kindred there, and had his claims allowed; The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay, Sate by his fire, and talked the night away; Wept o'er his wounds, or, tales of sorrow done, Shouldered his crutch, and shewed how fields were won. Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow, And quite forgot their vices in their woe; Careless their merits, or their faults to scan, His pity gave ere charity began. Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, And even his failings leaned to Virtue's side; But in his duty prompt at every call, He watched and wept, he prayed and felt, for all. And, as a bird each fond endearment tries, To tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies; He tried each art, reproved each dull delay, Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way. Beside the bed where parting life was layed, And sorrow, guilt, and pain, by turns, dismayed The reverend champion stood. At his control Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul; Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise, And his last faltering accents whispered praise. At church, with meek and unaffected grace, His looks adorned the venerable place; Truth from his lips prevailed with double sway, And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray. The service past, around the pious man, With steady zeal, each honest rustic ran; Even children followed, with endearing wile, And plucked his gown, to share the good man's smile. His ready smile a parent's warmth exprest, Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distrest: To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given, But all his serious thoughts had rest in Heaven. As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form, Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm, Tho' round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, Eternal sunshine settles on its head. Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way, With blossomed furze unprofitably gay, There, in his noisy mansion, skill'd to rule, The village master taught his little school; A man severe he was, and stern to view, I knew him well, and every truant knew; Well had the boding tremblers learned to trace The day's disasters in his morning face; Full well they laughed, with counterfeited glee, At all his jokes, for many a joke had he: Full well the busy whisper circling round, Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned; Yet he was kind, or if severe in aught, The love he bore to learning was in fault; The village all declared how much he knew; 'Twas certain he could write, and cypher too; Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage, And ev'n the story ran that he could gauge. In arguing too, the parson owned his skill, For even tho' vanquished, he could argue still; While words of learned length and thundering sound, Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around; And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew, That one small head could carry all he knew. But past is all his fame. The very spot Where many a time he triumphed, is forgot. Near yonder thorn, that lifts its head on high, Where once the sign-post caught the passing eye, Low lies that house where nut-brown draughts inspired, Where grey-beard mirth and smiling toil retired, Where village statesmen talked with looks profound, And news much older than their ale went round. Imagination fondly stoops to trace The parlour splendours of that festive place; The white-washed wall, the nicely sanded floor, The varnished clock that clicked behind the door; The chest contrived a double debt to pay, A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day; The pictures placed for ornament and use, The twelve good rules, the royal game of goose; The hearth, except when winter chill'd the day, With aspen boughs, and flowers, and fennel gay; While broken tea-cups, wisely kept for shew, Ranged o'er the chimney, glistened in a row. Vain transitory splendours! Could not all Reprieve the tottering mansion from its fall! Obscure it sinks, nor shall it more impart An hour's importance to the poor man's heart; Thither no more the peasant shall repair To sweet oblivion of his daily care; No more the farmer's news, the barber's tale, No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail; No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear, Relax his ponderous strength, and lean to hear; The host himself no longer shall be found Careful to see the mantling bliss go round; Nor the coy maid, half willing to be prest, Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest. Yes! let the rich deride, the proud disdain, These simple blessings of the lowly train; To me more dear, congenial to my heart, One native charm, than all the gloss of art; Spontaneous joys, where Nature has its play, The soul adopts, and owns their first-born sway; Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mind, Unenvied, unmolested, unconfined. But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade, With all the freaks of wanton wealth arrayed, In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain, The toiling pleasure sickens into pain; And, even while fashion's brightest arts decoy, The heart distrusting asks, if this be joy. Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen who survey The rich man's joys encrease, the poor's decay, 'Tis yours to judge, how wide the limits stand Between a splendid and a happy land. Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore, And shouting Folly hails them from her shore; Hoards even beyond the miser's wish abound, And rich men flock from all the world around. Yet count our gains. This wealth is but a name That leaves our useful products still the same. Not so the loss. The man of wealth and pride Takes up a space that many poor supplied; Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds, Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds: The robe that wraps his limbs in silken sloth, Has robbed the neighbouring fields of half their growth; His seat, where solitary sports are seen, Indignant spurns the cottage from the green: Around the world each needful product flies, For all the luxuries the world supplies. While thus the land adorned for pleasure, all In barren splendour feebly waits the fall. As some fair female unadorned and plain, Secure to please while youth confirms her reign, Slights every borrowed charm that dress supplies, Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes. But when those charms are past, for charms are frail, When time advances, and when lovers fail, She then shines forth, solicitous to bless, In all the glaring impotence of dress. Thus fares the land, by luxury betrayed: In nature's simplest charms at first arrayed; But verging to decline, its splendours rise, Its vistas strike, its palaces surprize; While, scourged by famine from the smiling land, The mournful peasant leads his humble band; And while he sinks, without one arm to save, The country blooms—a garden, and a grave. Where then, ah where, shall poverty reside, To scape the pressure of contiguous pride? If to some common's fenceless limits strayed, He drives his flock to pick the scanty blade, Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide, And ev'n the bare-worn common is denied. If to the city sped—What waits him there? To see profusion that he must not share; To see ten thousand baneful arts combined To pamper luxury, and thin mankind; To see those joys the sons of pleasure know, Extorted from his fellow-creature's woe. Here while the courtier glitters in brocade, There the pale artist plies the sickly trade; Here while the proud their long-drawn pomps display, There the black gibbet glooms beside the way. The dome where Pleasure holds her midnight reign, Here, richly deckt, admits the gorgeous train; Tumultuous grandeur crowds the blazing square, The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare. Sure scenes like these no troubles e'er annoy! Sure these denote one universal joy! Are these thy serious thoughts?—Ah, turn thine eyes Where the poor houseless shivering female lies. She once, perhaps, in village plenty blest, Has wept at tales of innocence distrest; Her modest looks the cottage might adorn Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn: Now lost to all; her friends, her virtue fled, Near her betrayer's door she lays her head, And, pinch'd with cold, and shrinking from the shower, With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour When idly first, ambitious of the town, She left her wheel and robes of country brown. Do thine, sweet Auburn, thine, the loveliest train, Do thy fair tribes participate her pain? Even now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led, At proud men's doors they ask a little bread! Ah, no. To distant climes, a dreary scene, Where half the convex world intrudes between, Through torrid tracts with fainting steps they go, Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe. Far different there from all that charm'd before, The various terrors of that horrid shore; Those blazing suns that dart a downward ray, And fiercely shed intolerable day; Those matted woods where birds forget to sing, But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling; Those poisonous fields with rank luxuriance crowned, Where the dark scorpion gathers death around; Where at each step the stranger fears to wake The rattling terrors of the vengeful snake; Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey, And savage men, more murderous still than they; While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies, Mingling the ravaged landscape with the skies. Far different these from every former scene, The cooling brook, the grassy vested green, The breezy covert of the warbling grove, That only shelter'd thefts of harmless love. Good Heaven! what sorrows gloom'd that parting day, That called them from their native walks away; When the poor exiles, every pleasure past, Hung round their bowers, and fondly looked their last, And took a long farewell, and wished in vain For seats like these beyond the western main; And shuddering still to face the distant deep, Returned and wept, and still returned to weep. The good old sire the first prepared to go To new found worlds, and wept for others woe. But for himself, in conscious virtue brave, He only wished for worlds beyond the grave. His lovely daughter, lovelier in her tears, The fond companion of his helpless years, Silent went next, neglectful of her charms, And left a lover's for a father's arms. With louder plaints the mother spoke her woes, And blessed the cot where every pleasure rose; And kist her thoughtless babes with many a tear, And claspt them close, in sorrow doubly dear; Whilst her fond husband strove to lend relief In all the silent manliness of grief. O luxury! thou curst by Heaven's decree, How ill exchanged are things like these for thee! How do thy potions, with insidious joy, Diffuse their pleasures only to destroy! Kingdoms, by thee, to sickly greatness grown, Boast of a florid vigour not their own; At every draught more large and large they grow, A bloated mass of rank unwieldy woe; Till sapped their strength, and every part unsound, Down, down they sink, and spread a ruin round. Even now the devastation is begun, And half the business of destruction done; Even now, methinks, as pondering here I stand, I see the rural virtues leave the land: Down where yon anchoring vessel spreads the sail, That idly waiting flaps with every gale, Downward they move, a melancholy band, Pass from the shore, and darken all the strand. Contented toil, and hospitable care, And kind connubial tenderness, are there; And piety with wishes placed above, And steady loyalty, and faithful love. And thou, sweet Poetry, thou loveliest maid, Still first to fly where sensual joys invade; Unfit in these degenerate times of shame, To catch the heart, or strike for honest fame; Dear charming nymph, neglected and decried, My shame in crowds, my solitary pride; Thou source of all my bliss, and all my woe, That found'st me poor at first, and keep'st me so; Thou guide by which the nobler arts excell, Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee well! Farewell, and O where'er thy voice be tried, On Torno's cliffs, or Pambamarca's side, Whether were equinoctial fervours glow, Or winter wraps the polar world in snow, Still let thy voice, prevailing over time, Redress the rigours of the inclement clime; Aid slighted truth with thy persuasive strain, Teach erring man to spurn the rage of gain; Teach him, that states of native strength possest, Tho' very poor, may still be very blest; That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay, As ocean sweeps the labour'd mole away; While self-dependent power can time defy, As rocks resist the billows and the sky.

The Deserted Village Oliver Goldsmith ??

1 ONE Day the Amarous Lisander, By an impatient Passion sway'd, Surpris'd fair Cloris, that lov'd Maid, Who cou'd defend her self no longer ; All things did with his Love conspire, The gilded Planet of the Day, In his gay Chariot, drawn by Fire, Was now descending to the Sea, And left no Light to guide the World, But what from Cloris brighter Eyes was hurl'd. 2 In alone Thicket, made for Love, Silent as yielding Maids Consent, She with a charming Languishment Permits his force, yet gently strove ? Her Hands his Bosom softly meet, But not to put him back design'd, Rather to draw him on inclin'd, Whilst he lay trembling at her feet; Resistance 'tis to late to shew, She wants the pow'r to say — Ah!what do you do? 3 Her bright Eyes sweat, and yet Severe, Where Love and Shame confus'dly strive, Fresh Vigor to Lisander give : And whispring softly in his Ear, She Cry'd — Cease — cease — your vain desire, Or I'll call out — What wou'd you do ? My dearer Honour, ev'n to you, I cannot — must not give — retire, Or take that Life whose chiefest part I gave you with the Conquest of my Heart. 4 But he as much unus'd to fear, As he was capable of Love, The blessed Minutes to improve, Kisses her Lips, her Neck, her Hair ! Each touch her new Desires alarms ! His burning trembling Hand he prest Upon her melting Snowy Breast, While she lay panting in his Arms ! All her unguarded Beauties lie The Spoils and Trophies of the Enemy. 5 And now, without Respect or Fear, He seeks the Objects of his Vows ; His Love no Modesty allows : By swift degrees advancing where His daring Hand that Alter seiz'd, Where Gods of Love do Sacrifice ; That awful Throne, that Paradise, Where Rage is tam'd, and Anger pleas'd ; That Living Fountain, from whose Trills The melted Soul in liquid Drops distils. 6 Her balmy Lips encountring his, Their Bodies as their Souls are joyn'd, Where both in Transports were confin'd, Extend themselves upon the Moss. Cloris half dead and breathless lay, Her Eyes appear'd like humid Light, Such as divides the Day and Night; Or falling Stars, whose Fires decay ; And now no signs of Life she shows, But what in short-breath-sighs returns and goes. 7 He saw how at her length she lay, He saw her rising Bosom bare, Her loose thin Robes, through which appear A Shape design'd for Love and Play; Abandon'd by her Pride and Shame, She do's her softest Sweets dispence, Offring her Virgin-Innocence A Victim to Loves Sacred Flame ; Whilst th' or'e ravish'd Shepherd lies, Unable to perform the Sacrifice. 8 Ready to taste a Thousand Joys, Thee too transported hapless Swain, Found the vast Pleasure turn'd to Pain : Pleasure, which too much Love destroys ! The willing Garments by he laid, And Heav'n all open to his view ; Mad to possess, himself he threw On the defenceless lovely Maid. But oh ! what envious Gods conspire To snatch his Pow'r, yet leave him the Desire ! 9 Natures support, without whose Aid She can no humane Being give, It self now wants the Art to live, Faintness it slacken'd Nerves invade : In vain th' enraged Youth assaid To call his fleeting Vigour back, No Motion 'twill from Motion take, Excess of Love his Love betray'd ; In vain he Toils, in vain Commands, Th' Insensible fell weeping in his Hands. 10 In this so Am'rous cruel strife, Where Love and Fate were too severe, The poor Lisander in Despair, Renounc'd his Reason with his Life. Now all the Brisk and Active Fire That should the Nobler Part inflame, Unactive Frigid, Dull became, And left no Spark for new Desire ; Not all her Naked Charms cou'd move, Or calm that Rage that had debauch'd his Love. 11 Cloris returning from the Trance Which Love and soft Desire had bred, Her tim'rous Hand she gently laid, Or guided by Design or Chance, Upon that Fabulous Priapus, That Potent God (as Poets feign.) But never did young Shepherdess (Gath'ring of Fern upon the Plain) More nimbly draw her Fingers back, Finding beneath the Verdant Leaves a Snake. 12 Then Cloris her fair Hand withdrew, Finding that God of her Desires Disarm'd of all his pow'rful Fires, And cold as Flow'rs bath'd in the Morning-dew. Who can the Nymphs Confusion guess ? The Blood forsook the kinder place, And strew'd with Blushes all her Face, Which both Disdain and Shame express ; And from Lisanders Arms she fled, Leaving him fainting on the gloomy Bed. 13 Like Lightning through the Grove she hies, Or Daphne from the Delphick God ; No Print upon the Grassie Road She leaves, t' instruct pursuing Eyes. The Wind that wanton'd in her Hair, And with her ruffled Garments plaid, Discover'd in the flying Maid All that the Gods e're made of Fair. So Venus, when her Love was Slain, With fear and haste flew o're the fatal Plain. 14 The Nymphs resentments, none but I Can well imagin, and Condole ; But none can guess Lisander's Soul, But those who sway'd his Destiny : His silent Griefs, swell up to Storms, And not one God, his Fury spares, He Curst his Birth, his Fate, his Stars, But more the Shepherdesses Charms ; Whose soft bewitching influence, Had Damn'd him to the Hell of Impotence.

The Disappointment Aphra Behn ?

Part I On either side the river lie Long fields of barley and of rye, That clothe the wold and meet the sky; And thro' the field the road runs by To many-tower'd Camelot; The yellow-leaved waterlily The green-sheathed daffodilly Tremble in the water chilly Round about Shalott. Willows whiten, aspens shiver. The sunbeam showers break and quiver In the stream that runneth ever By the island in the river Flowing down to Camelot. Four gray walls, and four gray towers Overlook a space of flowers, And the silent isle imbowers The Lady of Shalott. Underneath the bearded barley, The reaper, reaping late and early, Hears her ever chanting cheerly, Like an angel, singing clearly, O'er the stream of Camelot. Piling the sheaves in furrows airy, Beneath the moon, the reaper weary Listening whispers, ' 'Tis the fairy, Lady of Shalott.' The little isle is all inrail'd With a rose-fence, and overtrail'd With roses: by the marge unhail'd The shallop flitteth silken sail'd, Skimming down to Camelot. A pearl garland winds her head: She leaneth on a velvet bed, Full royally apparelled, The Lady of Shalott. Part II No time hath she to sport and play: A charmed web she weaves alway. A curse is on her, if she stay Her weaving, either night or day, To look down to Camelot. She knows not what the curse may be; Therefore she weaveth steadily, Therefore no other care hath she, The Lady of Shalott. She lives with little joy or fear. Over the water, running near, The sheepbell tinkles in her ear. Before her hangs a mirror clear, Reflecting tower'd Camelot. And as the mazy web she whirls, She sees the surly village churls, And the red cloaks of market girls Pass onward from Shalott. Sometimes a troop of damsels glad, An abbot on an ambling pad, Sometimes a curly shepherd lad, Or long-hair'd page in crimson clad, Goes by to tower'd Camelot: And sometimes thro' the mirror blue The knights come riding two and two: She hath no loyal knight and true, The Lady of Shalott. But in her web she still delights To weave the mirror's magic sights, For often thro' the silent nights A funeral, with plumes and lights And music, came from Camelot: Or when the moon was overhead Came two young lovers lately wed; 'I am half sick of shadows,' said The Lady of Shalott. Part III A bow-shot from her bower-eaves, He rode between the barley-sheaves, The sun came dazzling thro' the leaves, And flam'd upon the brazen greaves Of bold Sir Lancelot. A red-cross knight for ever kneel'd To a lady in his shield, That sparkled on the yellow field, Beside remote Shalott. The gemmy bridle glitter'd free, Like to some branch of stars we see Hung in the golden Galaxy. The bridle bells rang merrily As he rode down from Camelot: And from his blazon'd baldric slung A mighty silver bugle hung, And as he rode his armour rung, Beside remote Shalott. All in the blue unclouded weather Thick-jewell'd shone the saddle-leather, The helmet and the helmet-feather Burn'd like one burning flame together, As he rode down from Camelot. As often thro' the purple night, Below the starry clusters bright, Some bearded meteor, trailing light, Moves over green Shalott. His broad clear brow in sunlight glow'd; On burnish'd hooves his war-horse trode; From underneath his helmet flow'd His coal-black curls as on he rode, As he rode down from Camelot. From the bank and from the river He flash'd into the crystal mirror, 'Tirra lirra, tirra lirra:' Sang Sir Lancelot. She left the web, she left the loom She made three paces thro' the room She saw the water-flower bloom, She saw the helmet and the plume, She look'd down to Camelot. Out flew the web and floated wide; The mirror crack'd from side to side; 'The curse is come upon me,' cried The Lady of Shalott. Part IV In the stormy east-wind straining, The pale yellow woods were waning, The broad stream in his banks complaining, Heavily the low sky raining Over tower'd Camelot; Outside the isle a shallow boat Beneath a willow lay afloat, Below the carven stern she wrote, The Lady of Shalott. A cloudwhite crown of pearl she dight, All raimented in snowy white That loosely flew (her zone in sight Clasp'd with one blinding diamond bright) Her wide eyes fix'd on Camelot, Though the squally east-wind keenly Blew, with folded arms serenely By the water stood the queenly Lady of Shalott. With a steady stony glance— Like some bold seer in a trance, Beholding all his own mischance, Mute, with a glassy countenance— She look'd down to Camelot. It was the closing of the day: She loos'd the chain, and down she lay; The broad stream bore her far away, The Lady of Shalott. As when to sailors while they roam, By creeks and outfalls far from home, Rising and dropping with the foam, From dying swans wild warblings come, Blown shoreward; so to Camelot Still as the boathead wound along The willowy hills and fields among, They heard her chanting her deathsong, The Lady of Shalott. A longdrawn carol, mournful, holy, She chanted loudly, chanted lowly, Till her eyes were darken'd wholly, And her smooth face sharpen'd slowly, Turn'd to tower'd Camelot: For ere she reach'd upon the tide The first house by the water-side, Singing in her song she died, The Lady of Shalott. Under tower and balcony, By garden wall and gallery, A pale, pale corpse she floated by, Deadcold, between the houses high, Dead into tower'd Camelot. Knight and burgher, lord and dame, To the planked wharfage came: Below the stern they read her name, The Lady of Shalott. They cross'd themselves, their stars they blest, Knight, minstrel, abbot, squire, and guest. There lay a parchment on her breast, That puzzled more than all the rest, The wellfed wits at Camelot. 'The web was woven curiously, The charm is broken utterly, Draw near and fear not,—this is I, The Lady of Shalott.'

The Lady of Shalott Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Five hours, (and who can do it less in?) By haughty Celia spent in dressing; The goddess from her chamber issues, Arrayed in lace, brocades and tissues. Strephon, who found the room was void, And Betty otherwise employed, Stole in, and took a strict survey, Of all the litter as it lay; Whereof, to make the matter clear, An inventory follows here. And first a dirty smock appeared, Beneath the armpits well besmeared. Strephon, the rogue, displayed it wide, And turned it round on every side. On such a point few words are best, And Strephon bids us guess the rest, But swears how damnably the men lie, In calling Celia sweet and cleanly. Now listen while he next produces The various combs for various uses, Filled up with dirt so closely fixt, No brush could force a way betwixt. A paste of composition rare, Sweat, dandruff, powder, lead and hair; A forehead cloth with oil upon't To smooth the wrinkles on her front; Here alum flower to stop the steams, Exhaled from sour unsavory streams, There night-gloves made of Tripsy's hide, Bequeathed by Tripsy when she died, With puppy water, beauty's help Distilled from Tripsy's darling whelp; Here gallypots and vials placed, Some filled with washes, some with paste, Some with pomatum, paints and slops, And ointments good for scabby chops. Hard by a filthy basin stands, Fouled with the scouring of her hands; The basin takes whatever comes The scrapings of her teeth and gums, A nasty compound of all hues, For here she spits, and here she spews. But oh! it turned poor Strephon's bowels, When he beheld and smelled the towels, Begummed, bemattered, and beslimed With dirt, and sweat, and earwax grimed. No object Strephon's eye escapes, Here petticoats in frowzy heaps; Nor be the handkerchiefs forgot All varnished o'er with snuff and snot. The stockings why should I expose, Stained with the marks of stinking toes; Or greasy coifs and pinners reeking, Which Celia slept at least a week in? A pair of tweezers next he found To pluck her brows in arches round, Or hairs that sink the forehead low, Or on her chin like bristles grow. The virtues we must not let pass, Of Celia's magnifying glass. When frightened Strephon cast his eye on't It showed visage of a giant. A glass that can to sight disclose, The smallest worm in Celia's nose, And faithfully direct her nail To squeeze it out from head to tail; For catch it nicely by the head, It must come out alive or dead. Why Strephon will you tell the rest? And must you needs describe the chest? That careless wench! no creature warn her To move it out from yonder corner; But leave it standing full in sight For you to exercise your spite. In vain the workman showed his wit With rings and hinges counterfeit To make it seem in this disguise A cabinet to vulgar eyes; For Strephon ventured to look in, Resolved to go through thick and thin; He lifts the lid, there needs no more, He smelled it all the time before. As from within Pandora's box, When Epimetheus op'd the locks, A sudden universal crew Of human evils upwards flew; He still was comforted to find That Hope at last remained behind; So Strephon lifting up the lid, To view what in the chest was hid. The vapors flew from out the vent, But Strephon cautious never meant The bottom of the pan to grope, And foul his hands in search of Hope. O never may such vile machine Be once in Celia's chamber seen! O may she better learn to keep Those "secrets of the hoary deep!" As mutton cutlets, prime of meat, Which though with art you salt and beat As laws of cookery require, And toast them at the clearest fire; If from adown the hopeful chops The fat upon a cinder drops, To stinking smoke it turns the flame Pois'ning the flesh from whence it came, And up exhales a greasy stench, For which you curse the careless wench; So things, which must not be expressed, When plumped into the reeking chest, Send up an excremental smell To taint the parts from whence they fell. The petticoats and gown perfume, Which waft a stink round every room. Thus finishing his grand survey, Disgusted Strephon stole away Repeating in his amorous fits, Oh! Celia, Celia, Celia shits! But Vengeance, goddess never sleeping Soon punished Strephon for his peeping; His foul imagination links Each Dame he sees with all her stinks: And, if unsavory odors fly, Conceives a lady standing by: All women his description fits, And both ideas jump like wits: But vicious fancy coupled fast, And still appearing in contrast. I pity wretched Strephon blind To all the charms of female kind; Should I the queen of love refuse, Because she rose from stinking ooze? To him that looks behind the scene, Satira's but some pocky queen. When Celia in her glory shows, If Strephon would but stop his nose (Who now so impiously blasphemes Her ointments, daubs, and paints and creams, Her washes, slops, and every clout, With which he makes so foul a rout) He soon would learn to think like me, And bless his ravished sight to see Such order from confusion sprung, Such gaudy tulips raised from dung.

The Lady's Dressing Room Jonathan Swift Mock Heroic

Luxurious man, to bring his vice in use, Did after him the world seduce, And from the fields the flowers and plants allure, Where nature was most plain and pure. He first enclosed within the gardens square A dead and standing pool of air, And a more luscious earth for them did knead, Which stupified them while it fed. The pink grew then as double as his mind; The nutriment did change the kind. With strange perfumes he did the roses taint, And flowers themselves were taught to paint. The tulip, white, did for complexion seek, And learned to interline its cheek: Its onion root they then so high did hold, That one was for a meadow sold. Another world was searched, through oceans new, To find the Marvel of Peru. And yet these rarities might be allowed To man, that sovereign thing and proud, Had he not dealt between the bark and tree, Forbidden mixtures there to see. No plant now knew the stock from which it came; He grafts upon the wild the tame: That th' uncertain and adulterate fruit Might put the palate in dispute. His green seraglio has its eunuchs too, Lest any tyrant him outdo. And in the cherry he does nature vex, To procreate without a sex. 'Tis all enforced, the fountain and the grot, While the sweet fields do lie forgot: Where willing nature does to all dispense A wild and fragrant innocence: And fauns and fairies do the meadows till, More by their presence than their skill. Their statues, polished by some ancient hand, May to adorn the gardens stand: But howsoe'er the figures do excel, The gods themselves with us do dwell.

The Mower Against Gardens Andrew Marvell Pastoral

A fragment. In the dungeon-crypts idly did I stray, Reckless of the lives wasting there away; "Draw the ponderous bars! open, Warder stern!" He dared not say me nay—the hinges harshly turn. "Our guests are darkly lodged," I whisper'd, gazing through The vault, whose grated eye showed heaven more gray than blue; (This was when glad Spring laughed in awaking pride;) "Ay, darkly lodged enough!" returned my sullen guide. Then, God forgive my youth; forgive my careless tongue; I scoffed, as the chill chains on the damp flagstones rung: "Confined in triple walls, art thou so much to fear, That we must bind thee down and clench thy fetters here?" The captive raised her face; it was as soft and mild As sculptured marble saint, or slumbering unwean'd child; It was so soft and mild, it was so sweet and fair, Pain could not trace a line, nor grief a shadow there! The captive raised her hand and pressed it to her brow; "I have been struck," she said, "and I am suffering now; Yet these are little worth, your bolts and irons strong; And, were they forged in steel, they could not hold me long." Hoarse laughed the jailor grim: "Shall I be won to hear; Dost think, fond, dreaming wretch, that I shall grant thy prayer? Or, better still, wilt melt my master's heart with groans? Ah! sooner might the sun thaw down these granite stones. "My master's voice is low, his aspect bland and kind, But hard as hardest flint the soul that lurks behind; And I am rough and rude, yet not more rough to see Than is the hidden ghost that has its home in me." About her lips there played a smile of almost scorn, "My friend," she gently said, "you have not heard me mourn; When you my kindred's lives, MY lost life, can restore, Then may I weep and sue,—but never, friend, before! "Still, let my tyrants know, I am not doomed to wear Year after year in gloom, and desolate despair; A messenger of Hope comes every night to me, And offers for short life, eternal liberty. "He comes with western winds, with evening's wandering airs, With that clear dusk of heaven that brings the thickest stars. Winds take a pensive tone, and stars a tender fire, And visions rise, and change, that kill me with desire. "Desire for nothing known in my maturer years, When Joy grew mad with awe, at counting future tears. When, if my spirit's sky was full of flashes warm, I knew not whence they came, from sun or thunder-storm. "But, first, a hush of peace—a soundless calm descends; The struggle of distress, and fierce impatience ends; Mute music soothes my breast—unuttered harmony, That I could never dream, till Earth was lost to me. "Then dawns the Invisible; the Unseen its truth reveals; My outward sense is gone, my inward essence feels: Its wings are almost free—its home, its harbour found, Measuring the gulph, it stoops and dares the final bound, "Oh I dreadful is the check—intense the agony— When the ear begins to hear, and the eye begins to see; When the pulse begins to throb, the brain to think again; The soul to feel the flesh, and the flesh to feel the chain. "Yet I would lose no sting, would wish no torture less; The more that anguish racks, the earlier it will bless; And robed in fires of hell, or bright with heavenly shine, If it but herald death, the vision is divine!" She ceased to speak, and we, unanswering, turned to go— We had no further power to work the captive woe: Her cheek, her gleaming eye, declared that man had given A sentence, unapproved, and overruled by Heaven.

The Prisoner: A Fragment Emily Bronte

What dire offence from am'rous causes springs, What mighty contests rise from trivial things, I sing—This verse to Caryl, Muse! is due: This, ev'n Belinda may vouchsafe to view: Slight is the subject, but not so the praise, If she inspire, and he approve my lays. Say what strange motive, Goddess! could compel A well-bred lord t' assault a gentle belle? O say what stranger cause, yet unexplor'd, Could make a gentle belle reject a lord? In tasks so bold, can little men engage, And in soft bosoms dwells such mighty rage?

The Rape of the Lock Alexander Pope Mock Heroic

O Rose thou art sick. The invisible worm, That flies in the night In the howling storm: Has found out thy bed Of crimson joy: And his dark secret love Does thy life destroy.

The Sick Rose William Blake (Anapestic dimeter)

What art thou, Spleen, which ev'ry thing dost ape? Thou Proteus to abused mankind, Who never yet thy real cause could find, Or fix thee to remain in one continued shape. Still varying thy perplexing form, Now a Dead Sea thou'lt represent, A calm of stupid discontent, Then, dashing on the rocks wilt rage into a storm. Trembling sometimes thou dost appear, Dissolved into a panic fear; On sleep intruding dost thy shadows spread, Thy gloomy terrors round the silent bed, And crowd with boding dreams the melancholy head; Or, when the midnight hour is told, And drooping lids thou still dost waking hold, Thy fond delusions cheat the eyes, Before them antic specters dance, Unusual fires their pointed heads advance, And airy phantoms rise. Such was the monstrous vision seen, When Brutus (now beneath his cares opprest, And all Rome's fortunes rolling in his breast, Before Philippi's latest field, Before his fate did to Octavius lead) Was vanquished by the Spleen. Falsely, the mortal part we blame Or our depressed, and pond'rous frame, Which, till the first degrading sin Let thee, its dull attendant, in, Still with the other did comply, Nor clogged the active soul, disposed to fly, And range the mansions of its native sky. Nor, whilst in his own heaven he dwelt, Whilst Man his paradise possessed, His fertile Garden in the fragrant East, And all united odors smelled, No armèd sweets, until thy reign, Could shock the sense, or in the face A flushed, unhandsome color place. Now the jonquil o'ercomes the feeble brain; We faint beneath the aromatic pain, Till some offensive scent thy pow'rs appease, And pleasure we resign for short and nauseous ease. In ev'ry one thou dost possess, New are thy motions, and thy dress: Now in some grove a list'ning friend Thy false suggestions must attend, Thy whispered griefs, thy fancied sorrows hear, Breathed in a sigh, and witnessed by a tear; Whilst in the light and vulgar crowd, Thy slaves, more clamorous and loud, By laughters unprovoked, thy influence too confess. In the imperious wife thou vapors art, Which from o'erheated passions rise In clouds to the attractive brain, Until descending thence again, Through the o'er-cast and show'ring eyes, Upon her husband's softened heart, He the disputed point must yield, Something resign of the contested field; Till lordly Man, born to imperial sway, Compounds for peace, to make that right away, And Woman, arm'd with Spleen, does servilely obey. The fool, to imitate the wits, Complains of thy pretended fits, And dullness, born with him, would lay Upon thy accidental sway; Because, sometimes, thou dost presume Into the ablest heads to come: That, often, men of thoughts refined, Impatient of unequal sense, Such slow returns, where they so much dispense, Retiring from the crowd, are to thy shades inclined. O'er me alas! thou dost too much prevail: I feel thy force, whilst I against thee rail; I feel my verse decay, and my cramped numbers fail. Through thy black jaundice I all objects see, As dark and terrible as thee, My lines decried, and my employment thought An useless folly, or presumptuous fault: Whilst in the Muses' paths I stray, Whilst in their groves, and by their secret springs My hand delights to trace unusual things, And deviates from the known and common way; Nor will in fading silks compose Faintly th' inimitable rose, Fill up an ill-drawn bird, or paint on glass The sov'reign's blurred and undistinguished face, The threat'ning angel, and the speaking ass. Patron thou art to ev'ry gross abuse, The sullen husband's feigned excuse, When the ill humor with his wife he spends, And bears recruited wit, and spirits to his friends. The son of Bacchus pleads thy pow'r, As to the glass he still repairs, Pretends but to remove thy cares, Snatch from thy shades one gay and smiling hour, And drown thy kingdom in a purple show'r. When the Coquette, whom ev'ry fool admires, Would in variety be fair, And, changing hastily the scene, From light, impertinent, and vain, Assumes a soft, a melancholy air, And of her eyes rebates the wand'ring fires, The careless posture, and the head reclined, The thoughtful, and composèd face, Proclaiming the withdrawn, the absent mind, Allows the Fop more liberty to gaze, Who gently for the tender cause inquires; The cause, indeed, is a defect in sense, Yet is the Spleen alleged, and still the dull pretence. But these are thy fantastic harms, The tricks of thy pernicious stage, Which do the weaker sort engage; Worse are the dire effects of thy more pow'rful charms. By thee Religion, all we know, That should enlighten here below, Is veiled in darkness, and perplexed With anxious doubts, with endless scruples vexed, And some restraint implied from each perverted text. Whilst touch not, taste not, what is freely giv'n, Is but thy niggard voice, disgracing bounteous heav'n. From speech restrained, by thy deceits abused, To deserts banished, or in cells reclused, Mistaken vot'ries to the pow'rs divine, Whilst they a purer sacrifice design, Do but the Spleen obey, and worship at thy shrine. In vain to chase thee ev'ry art we try, In vain all remedies apply, In vain the Indian leaf infuse, Or the parched Eastern berry bruise; Some pass, in vain, those bounds, and nobler liquors use. Now harmony, in vain, we bring, Inspire the flute, and touch the string. From harmony no help is had; Music but soothes thee, if too sweetly sad, And if too light, but turns thee gaily mad. Though the physicians greatest gains, Although his growing wealth he sees Daily increased by ladies' fees, Yet dost thou baffle all his studious pains. Not skillful Lower thy source could find, Or through the well-dissected body trace The secret, the mysterious ways, By which thou dost surprise, and prey upon the mind. Though in the search, too deep for humane thought, With unsuccessful toil he wrought, 'Till thinking thee to've catched, himself by thee was caught, Retained thy pris'ner, thy acknowledged slave, And sunk beneath thy chain to a lamented grave.

The Spleen Anne Finch Pindaric ode

I caught this morning morning's minion, king- dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing, As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding Stirred for a bird, - the achieve of, the mastery of the thing! Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier! No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear, Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.

The Windhover Gerard Manley Hopkins

When I consider how my light is spent Ere half my days in this dark world and wide, And that one talent which is death to hide Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest he returning chide; "Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?" I fondly ask. But Patience to prevent That murmur, soon replies: "God doth not need Either man's work or his own gifts; who best Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state Is kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed And post o'er land and ocean without rest: They also serve who only stand and wait."

When I Consider How My Light is Spent John Milton (Sonnet)

Had we but world enough and time, This coyness, lady, were no crime. We would sit down, and think which way To walk, and pass our long love's day. Thou by the Indian Ganges' side Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide Of Humber would complain. I would Love you ten years before the flood, And you should, if you please, refuse Till the conversion of the Jews. My vegetable love should grow Vaster than empires and more slow; An hundred years should go to praise Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze; Two hundred to adore each breast, But thirty thousand to the rest; An age at least to every part, And the last age should show your heart. For, lady, you deserve this state, Nor would I love at lower rate. But at my back I always hear Time's wingèd chariot hurrying near; And yonder all before us lie Deserts of vast eternity. Thy beauty shall no more be found; Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound My echoing song; then worms shall try That long-preserved virginity, And your quaint honour turn to dust, And into ashes all my lust; The grave's a fine and private place, But none, I think, do there embrace. Now therefore, while the youthful hue Sits on thy skin like morning dew, And while thy willing soul transpires At every pore with instant fires, Now let us sport us while we may, And now, like amorous birds of prey, Rather at once our time devour Than languish in his slow-chapped power. Let us roll all our strength and all Our sweetness up into one ball, And tear our pleasures with rough strife Through the iron gates of life: Thus, though we cannot make our sun Stand still, yet we will make him run.

To His Coy Mistress Andrew Marvell Iambic tetrameter rhyming in couplets

In that wild deluge where the world was drown'd, When life and sin one common tomb had found, The first small prospect of a rising hill With various notes of joy the ark did fill: Yet when that flood in its own depths was drown'd, It left behind it false and slippery ground; And the more solemn pomp was still deferr'd, Till new-born nature in fresh looks appear'd. Thus, Royal Sir, to see you landed here, Was cause enough of triumph for a year: Nor would your care those glorious joys repeat, Till they at once might be secure and great: Till your kind beams, by their continued stay, Had warm'd the ground, and call'd the damps away, Such vapours, while your powerful influence dries, Then soonest vanish when they highest rise. Had greater haste these sacred rites prepared, Some guilty months had in your triumphs shared: But this untainted year is all your own; Your glories may without our crimes be shown. We had not yet exhausted all our store, When you refresh'd our joys by adding more: As Heaven, of old, dispensed celestial dew, You gave us manna, and still give us new. Now our sad ruins are removed from sight, The season too comes fraught with new delight: Time seems not now beneath his years to stoop, Nor do his wings with sickly feathers droop: Soft western winds waft o'er the gaudy spring, And open'd scenes of flowers and blossoms bring, To grace this happy day, while you appear, Not king of us alone, but of the year. All eyes you draw, and with the eyes the heart: Of your own pomp, yourself the greatest part: Loud shouts the nation's happiness proclaim, And Heaven this day is feasted with your name. Your cavalcade the fair spectators view, From their high standings, yet look up to you. From your brave train each singles out a prey, And longs to date a conquest from your day. Now charged with blessings while you seek repose, Officious slumbers haste your eyes to close; And glorious dreams stand ready to restore The pleasing shapes of all you saw before. Next to the sacred temple you are led, Where waits a crown for your more sacred head: How justly from the church that crown is due, Preserved from ruin, and restored by you! The grateful choir their harmony employ, Not to make greater, but more solemn joy. Wrapt soft and warm your name is sent on high, As flames do on the wings of incense fly: Music herself is lost; in vain she brings Her choicest notes to praise the best of kings: Her melting strains in you a tomb have found, And lie like bees in their own sweetness drown'd. He that brought peace, all discord could atone, His name is music of itself alone. Now while the sacred oil anoints your head, And fragrant scents, begun from you, are spread Through the large dome; the people's joyful sound, Sent back, is still preserved in hallow'd ground; Which in one blessing mix'd descends on you; As heighten'd spirits fall in richer dew. Not that our wishes do increase your store, Full of yourself, you can admit no more: We add not to your glory, but employ Our time, like angels, in expressing joy. Nor is it duty, or our hopes alone, Create that joy, but full fruition: We know those blessings, which we must possess, And judge of future by past happiness. No promise can oblige a prince so much Still to be good, as long to have been such. A noble emulation heats your breast, And your own fame now robs you of your rest. Good actions still must be maintain'd with good, As bodies nourish'd with resembling food. You have already quench'd sedition's brand; And zeal, which burnt it, only warms the land. The jealous sects, that dare not trust their cause So far from their own will as to the laws, You for their umpire and their synod take, And their appeal alone to Caesar make. Kind Heaven so rare a temper did provide, That guilt, repenting, might in it confide. Among our crimes oblivion may be set; But 'tis our king's perfection to forget. Virtues unknown to these rough northern climes From milder heavens you bring, without their crimes. Your calmness does no after-storms provide, Nor seeming patience mortal anger hide. When empire first from families did spring, Then every father govern'd as a king: But you, that are a sovereign prince, allay Imperial power with your paternal sway. From those great cares when ease your soul unbends, Your pleasures are design'd to noble ends: Born to command the mistress of the seas, Your thoughts themselves in that blue empire please. Hither in summer evenings you repair To taste the _fraicheur_ of the purer air: Undaunted here you ride, when winter raves, With Caesar's heart that rose above the waves. More I could sing, but fear my numbers stays; No loyal subject dares that courage praise. In stately frigates most delight you find, Where well-drawn battles fire your martial mind. What to your cares we owe, is learnt from hence, When even your pleasures serve for our defence. Beyond your court flows in th' admitted tide, Where in new depths the wondering fishes glide: Here in a royal bed[30] the waters sleep; When tired at sea, within this bay they creep. Here the mistrustful fowl no harm suspects, So safe are all things which our king protects. From your loved Thames a blessing yet is due, Second alone to that it brought in you; A queen, near whose chaste womb, ordain'd by fate, The souls of kings unborn for bodies wait. It was your love before made discord cease: Your love is destined to your country's peace. Both Indies, rivals in your bed, provide With gold or jewels to adorn your bride. This to a mighty king presents rich ore, While that with incense does a god implore. Two kingdoms wait your doom, and, as you choose, This must receive a crown, or that must lose. Thus from your royal oak, like Jove's of old, Are answers sought, and destinies foretold: Propitious oracles are begg'd with vows, And crowns that grow upon the sacred boughs. Your subjects, while you weigh the nation's fate, Suspend to both their doubtful love or hate: Choose only, Sir, that so they may possess, With their own peace their children's happiness.

To His Sacred Majesty, a Panegyric on His Coronation John Dryden Panegyric Ode

The time you won your town the race We chaired you through the market-place; Man and boy stood cheering by, And home we brought you shoulder-high. Today, the road all runners come, Shoulder-high we bring you home, And set you at your threshold down, Townsman of a stiller town. Smart lad, to slip betimes away From fields where glory does not stay, And early though the laurel grows It withers quicker than the rose. Eyes the shady night has shut Cannot see the record cut, And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears. Now you will not swell the rout Of lads that wore their honours out, Runners whom renown outran And the name died before the man. So set, before its echoes fade, The fleet foot on the sill of shade, And hold to the low lintel up The still-defended challenge-cup. And round that early-laurelled head Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead, And find unwithered on its curls The garland briefer than a girl's.

To an Athlete Dying Young

Fair lovely Maid, or if that Title be Too weak, too Feminine for Nobler thee, Permit a Name that more Approaches Truth: And let me call thee, Lovely Charming Youth. This last will justifie my soft complainte, While that may serve to lessen my constraint; And without Blushes I the Youth persue, When so much beauteous Woman is in view Against thy Charms we struggle but in vain With thy deluding Form thou giv'st us pain, While the bright Nymph betrays us to the Swain. In pity to our Sex sure thou wer't sent, That we might Love, and yet be Innocent: For sure no Crime with thee we can commit; Or if we shou'd - thy Form excuses it. For who, that gathers fairest Flowers believes A Snake lies hid beneath the Fragrant Leaves. Thou beauteous Wonder of a different kind, Soft Cloris with the dear Alexis join'd; When e'er the Manly part of thee, wou'd plead Thou tempts us with the Image of the Maid, While we the noblest Passions do extend The Love to Hermes, Aphrodite the Friend.

To the Fair Clarinda Aphra Behn ?

Farewell, too little and too lately known, Whom I began to think and call my own; For sure our souls were near ally'd; and thine Cast in the same poetic mould with mine. One common note on either lyre did strike, And knaves and fools we both abhorr'd alike: To the same goal did both our studies drive, The last set out the soonest did arrive. Thus Nisus fell upon the slippery place, While his young friend perform'd and won the race. O early ripe! to thy abundant store What could advancing age have added more? It might (what nature never gives the young) Have taught the numbers of thy native tongue. But satire needs not those, and wit will shine Through the harsh cadence of a rugged line. A noble error, and but seldom made, When poets are by too much force betray'd. Thy generous fruits, though gather'd ere their prime Still show'd a quickness; and maturing time But mellows what we write to the dull sweets of rhyme. Once more, hail and farewell; farewell thou young, But ah too short, Marcellus of our tongue; Thy brows with ivy, and with laurels bound; But fate and gloomy night encompass thee around.

To the Memory of Mr. Oldham John Dryden

selection from the Aeneid

Virgil

We are Seven

William Wordsworth

Strephon. Ye goatherd gods, that love the grassy mountains, Ye nymphs which haunt the springs in pleasant valleys, Ye satyrs joyed with free and quiet forests, Vouchsafe your silent ears to plaining music, Which to my woes gives still an early morning, And draws the dolor on till weary evening. Klaius. O Mercury, forgoer to the evening, O heavenly huntress of the savage mountains, O lovely star, entitled of the morning, While that my voice doth fill these woeful valleys, Vouchsafe you silent ears to plaining music, Which oft hath Echo tired in secret forests. Strephon. I, that was once free burgess of the forests, Where shade from sun and sport I sought in evening, I that was once esteemed for pleasant music, Am banished now among the monstrous mountains Of huge despair, and foul affliction's valleys, Am grown a screech owl to myself each morning. Klaius. I, that was once delighted every morning, Hunting the wild inhabiters of forests, I, that was once the music of these valleys, So darkened am that all my day is evening, Heartbroken so that molehills seem high mountains, And fill the vales with cries instead of music. Strephon. Long since, alas, my deadly swannish music Hath made itself a crier of the morning, And hath with wailing strength climbed highest mountains; Long since my thoughts more desert be than forests, Long since I see my joys come to their evening, And state thrown down to overtrodden valleys. Klaius. Long since the happy dwellers of these valleys, Have prayed me leave my strange exclaiming music Which troubles their day's work and joys of evening; Long since I hate the night, more hate the morning; Long since my thoughts chase me like beasts in forests And make me wish myself laid under mountains. Strephon. Meseems I see the high and stately mountains, Transform themselves to low dejected valleys; Meseems I hear in these ill-changed forests The nightingales do learn of owls their music; Meseems I feel the comfort of the morning Turned to the mortal serene of an evening. Klaius. Meseems I see a filthy cloudy evening As soon as sun begins to climb the mountains; Meseems I feel a noisome scent, the morning When I do smell the flowers of these valleys; Meseems I hear, when I do hear sweet music, The dreadful cries of murdered men in forests. Strephon. I wish to fire the trees of all these forests; I give the sun a last farewell each evening; I curse the fiddling finders-out of music; With envy I do hate the lofty mountains, And with despite despise the humble valleys; I do detest night, evening, day, and morning. Klaius. Curse to myself my prayer is, the morning; My fire is more than can be made with forests, My state more base than are the basest valleys. I wish no evenings more to see, each evening; Shamed, I hate myself in sight of mountains, And stop mine ears, lest I grow mad with music. Strephon. For she whose parts maintained a perfect music, Whose beauties shined more than the blushing morning, Who much did pass in state the stately mountains, In straightness past the cedars of the forests, Hath cast me, wretch, into eternal evening By taking her two suns from these dark valleys. Klaius. For she, with whom compared, the Alps are valleys, She, whose least word brings from the spheres their music, At whose approach the sun rose in the evening, Who where she went bore in her forehead morning, Is gone, is gone, from these our spoiled forests, Turning to deserts our best pastured mountains. Strephon. These mountains witness shall, so shall these valleys, Klaius. These forests eke, made wretched by our music, Both. Our morning hymn this is, and song at evening.

Ye Goatherd Gods Sir Philip Sidney Pastoral, double sestina

On thy stupendous summit, rock sublime! That o'er the channel reared, half way at sea The mariner at early morning hails, I would recline; while Fancy should go forth, And represent the strange and awful hour Of vast concussion; when the Omnipotent Stretched forth his arm, and rent the solid hills, Bidding the impetuous main flood rush between The rifted shores, and from the continent Eternally divided this green isle. Imperial lord of the high southern coast! From thy projecting head-land I would mark Far in the east the shades of night disperse, Melting and thinned, as from the dark blue wave Emerging, brilliant rays of arrowy light Dart from the horizon; when the glorious sun Just lifts above it his resplendent orb. Advances now, with feathery silver touched, The rippling tide of flood; glisten the sands, While, inmates of the chalky clefts that scar Thy sides precipitous, with shrill harsh cry, Their white wings glancing in the level beam, The terns, and gulls, and tarrocks, seek their food, And thy rough hollows echo to the voice Of the gray choughs, and ever restless daws, With clamor, not unlike the chiding hounds, While the lone shepherd, and his baying dog, Drive to thy turfy crest his bleating flock. The high meridian of the day is past, And Ocean now, reflecting the calm Heaven, Is of cerulean hue; and murmurs low The tide of ebb, upon the level sands. The sloop, her angular canvas shifting still, Catches the light and variable airs That but a little crisp the summer sea, Dimpling its tranquil surface.

from Beachy Head Charlotte Smith

See, Winter comes to rule the varied year, Sullen and sad, with all his rising train— Vapours, and clouds, and storms. Be these my theme, These, that exalt the soul to solemn thought And heavenly musing. Welcome, kindred glooms! Congenial horrors, hail! With frequent foot, Pleas'd have I, in my cheerful morn of life, When nurs'd by careless solitude I liv'd And sung of Nature with unceasing joy, Pleas'd have I wander'd through your rough domain; Trod the pure virgin-snows, myself as pure; Heard the winds roar, and the big torrent burst; Or seen the deep-fermenting tempest brew'd In the grim evening-sky. Thus pass'd the time, Till through the lucid chambers of the south Look'd out the joyous Spring—look'd out and smil'd. Now, when the cheerless empire of the sky To Capricorn the Centaur-Archer yields, And fierce Aquarius stains th' inverted year, Hung o'er the farthest verge of heaven, the sun Scarce spreads o'er ether the dejected day. Faint are his gleams, and ineffectual shoot His struggling rays in horizontal lines Through the thick air; as cloth'd in cloudy storm, Weak, wan, and broad, he skirts the southern sky; And, soon descending, to the long dark night, Wide-shading all, the prostrate world resigns. Nor is the night unwish'd; while vital heat, Light, life, and joy the dubious day forsake. Meantime, in sable cincture, shadows vast, Deep-ting'd and damp, and congregated clouds, And all the vapoury turbulence of heaven Involve the face of things. Thus Winter falls, A heavy gloom oppressive o'er the world, Through Nature shedding influence malign, And rouses up the seeds of dark disease. The soul of man dies in him, loathing life, And black with more than melancholy views. The cattle droop; and o'er the furrow'd land, Fresh from the plough, the dun discolour'd flocks, Untended spreading, crop the wholesome root. Along the woods, along the moorish fens, Sighs the sad genius of the coming storm; And up among the loose disjointed cliffs And fractur'd mountains wild, the brawling brook And cave, presageful, sends a hollow moan, Resounding long in listening Fancy's ear. Nature! great parent! whose unceasing hand Rolls round the seasons of the changeful year, How mighty, how majestic are thy works! With what a pleasing dread they swell the soul, That sees astonish'd, and astonish'd sings! Ye too, ye winds! that now begin to blow With boisterous sweep, I raise my voice to you. Where are your stores, ye powerful beings! say, Where your a{:e}rial magazines reserv'd, To swell the brooding terrors of the storm? In what far-distant region of the sky, Hush'd in deep silence, sleep you when 'tis calm? When from the pallid sky the sun descends, With many a spot, that o'er his glaring orb Uncertain wanders, stain'd; red fiery streaks Begin to flush around. The reeling clouds Stagger with dizzy poise, as doubting yet Which master to obey; while, rising slow, Blank in the leaden-colour'd east, the moon Wears a wan circle round her blunted horns. Seen through the turbid, fluctuating air, The stars obtuse emit a shivering ray; Or frequent seem to shoot athwart the gloom, And long behind them trail the whitening blaze. Snatch'd in short eddies, plays the wither'd leaf; And on the flood the dancing feather floats. With broaden'd nostrils to the sky upturn'd, The conscious heifer snuffs the stormy gale. Even as the matron, at her nightly task, With pensive labour draws the flaxen thread, The wasted taper and the crackling flame Foretell the blast. But chief the plumy race, The tenants of the sky, its changes speak. Retiring from the downs, where all day long They pick'd their scanty fare, a black'ning train Of clamorous rooks thick-urge their weary flight, And seek the closing shelter of the grove. Assiduous, in his bower, the wailing owl Plies his sad song. The cormorant on high Wheels from the deep, and screams along the land. Loud shrieks the soaring hern; and with wild wing The circling sea-fowl cleave the flaky clouds. Ocean, unequal press'd, with broken tide And blind commotion heaves; while from the shore, Eat into caverns by the restless wave, And forest-rustling mountain comes a voice That, solemn-sounding, bids the world prepare. Then issues forth the storm with sudden burst, And hurls the whole precipitated air Down in a torrent. On the passive main Descends th' ethereal force, and with strong gust Turns from its bottom the discolour'd deep. Through the black night that sits immense around, Lash'd into foam, the fierce-conflicting brine Seems o'er a thousand raging waves to burn. Meantime the mountain-billows, to the clouds In dreadful tumult swell'd, surge above surge, Burst into chaos with tremendous roar, And anchor'd navies from their stations drive, Wild as the winds across the howling waste Of mighty waters: now th' inflated wave Straining they scale, and now impetuous shoot Into the secret chambers of the deep, The wintry Baltic thund'ring o'er their head. Emerging thence again, before the breath Of full-exerted heaven they wing their course, And dart on distant coasts, if some sharp rock Or shoal insidious break not their career, And in loose fragments fling them floating round. Nor less at hand the loosen'd tempest reigns. The mountain thunders, and its sturdy sons Stoop to the bottom of the rocks they shade. Lone on the midnight steep, and all aghast, The dark wayfaring stranger breathless toils, And, often falling, climbs against the blast. Low waves the rooted forest, vex'd, and sheds What of its tarnish'd honours yet remain; Dash'd down and scatter'd, by the tearing wind's Assiduous fury, its gigantic limbs. Thus struggling through the dissipated grove, The whirling tempest raves along the plain; And, on the cottage thatch'd or lordly roof, Keen-fastening, shakes them to the solid base. Sleep frighted flies; and round the rocking dome, For entrance eager, howls the savage blast. Then too, they say, through all the burden'd air Long groans are heard, shrill sounds, and distant sighs, That, utter'd by the demon of the night, Warn the devoted wretch of woe and death. Huge uproar lords it wide. The clouds, commix'd With stars swift-gliding, sweep along the sky. All Nature reels: till Nature's King, who oft Amid tempestuous darkness dwells alone, And on the wings of the careering wind Walks dreadfully serene, commands a calm; Then straight air, sea, and earth are hush'd at once. As yet 'tis midnight deep. The weary clouds, Slow-meeting, mingle into solid gloom. Now, while the drowsy world lies lost in sleep, Let me associate with the serious Night, And Contemplation, her sedate compeer; Let me shake off th' intrusive cares of day, And lay the meddling senses all aside. Where now, ye lying vanities of life! Ye ever-tempting, ever-cheating train! Where are you now? and what is your amount? Vexation, disappointment, and remorse. Sad, sick'ning thought! and yet deluded man, A scene of crude disjointed visions past, And broken slumbers, rises still resolv'd, With new-flush'd hopes, to run the giddy round. Father of light and life! thou Good Supreme! O teach me what is good! teach me Thyself! Save me from folly, vanity, and vice, From every low pursuit; and feed my soul With knowledge, conscious peace, and virtue pure, Sacred, substantial, never-fading bliss! The keener tempests come; and, fuming dun From all the livid east or piercing north, Thick clouds ascend, in whose capacious womb A vapoury deluge lies, to snow congeal'd. Heavy they roll their fleecy world along, And the sky saddens with the gather'd storm. Through the hush'd air the whitening shower descends, At first thin-wavering; till at last the flakes Fall broad and wide and fast, dimming the day With a continual flow. The cherish'd fields Put on their winter robe of purest white. 'Tis brightness all; save where the new snow melts Along the mazy current. Low the woods Bow their hoar head; and, ere the languid sun, Faint from the west, emits his evening ray, Earth's universal face, deep-hid and chill, Is one wild dazzling waste, that buries wide The works of man. Drooping, the labourer-ox Stands cover'd o'er with snow, and then demands The fruit of all his toil. The fowls of heaven, Tam'd by the cruel season, crowd around The winnowing store, and claim the little boon Which Providence assigns them. One alone, The redbreast, sacred to the household gods, Wisely regardful of th' embroiling sky, In joyless fields and thorny thickets leaves His shivering mates, and pays to trusted man His annual visit. Half-afraid, he first Against the window beats; then, brisk, alights On the warm hearth; then hopping o'er the floor, Eyes all the smiling family askance, And pecks, and starts, and wonders where he is; Till, more familiar grown, the table-crumbs Attract his slender feet. The foodless wilds Pour forth their brown inhabitants. The hare, Though timorous of heart, and hard beset By death in various forms, dark snares, and dogs, And more unpitying men, the garden seeks, Urg'd on by fearless want. The bleating kind Eye the bleak heaven, and next the glistening earth, With looks of dumb despair; then, sad-dispers'd, Dig for the wither'd herb through heaps of snow. Now, shepherds, to your helpless charge be kind; Baffle the raging year, and fill their pens With food at will; lodge them below the storm, And watch them strict: for, from the bellowing east, In this dire season, oft the whirlwind's wing Sweeps up the burden of whole wintry plains In one wide waft, and o'er the hapless flocks, Hid in the hollow of two neighbouring hills, The billowy tempest whelms; till, upward urg'd, The valley to a shinning mountain swells, Tipp'd with a wreath high-curling in the sky. Ah! little think the gay licentious proud, Whom pleasure, power, and affluence surround— They, who their thoughtless hours in giddy mirth, And wanton, often cruel, riot waste— Ah! little think they, while they dance along, How many feel, this very moment, death And all the sad variety of pain; How many sink in the devouring flood, Or more devouring flame; how many bleed, By shameful variance betwixt man and man; How many pine in want, and dungeon-glooms, Shut from the common air and common use Of their own limbs; how many drink the cup Of baleful grief, or eat the bitter bread Of misery; sore pierc'd by wintry winds, How many shrink into the sordid hut Of cheerless poverty; how many shake With all the fiercer tortures of the mind, Unbounded passion, madness, guilt, remorse; Whence, tumbled headlong from the height of life, They furnish matter for the tragic muse. Even in the vale, where wisdom loves to dwell, With friendship, peace, and contemplation join'd, How many, rack'd with honest passions, droop In deep retir'd distress, how many stand Around the death-bed of their dearest friends, And point the parting anguish! Thought fond man Of these, and all the thousand nameless ills That one incessant struggle render life, One scene of toil, of suffering, and of fate, Vice in his high career would stand appall'd, And heedless rambling Impulse learn to think; The conscious heart of Charity would warm, And her wide wish Benevolence dilate; The social tear would rise, the social sigh; And, into clear perfection, gradual bliss, Refining still, the social passions work. Now, all amid the rigours of the year, In the wild depth of winter, while without The ceaseless winds blow ice, be my retreat, Between the groaning forest and the shore, Beat by the boundless multitude of waves, A rural, shelter'd, solitary scene; Where ruddy fire and beaming tapers join To cheer the gloom. There studious let me sit, And hold high converse with the mighty dead: Sages of ancient time, as gods rever'd, As gods beneficent, who bless'd mankind With arts and arms, and humaniz'd a world. Rous'd at th' inspiring thought, I throw aside The long-liv'd volume, and deep-musing hail The sacred shades that slowly rising pass Before my wandering eyes. First Socrates, Who, firmly good in a corrupted state, Against the rage of tyrants single stood Invincible! calm reason's holy law, That voice of God within th' attentive mind, Obeying, fearless or in life or death: Great moral teacher! wisest of mankind! Solon the next, who built his commonweal On equity's wide base; by tender laws A lively people curbing, yet undamp'd Preserving still that quick peculiar fire, Whence in the laurel'd field of finer arts, And of bold freedom, they unequal'd shone, The pride of smiling Greece and human-kind. Lycurgus then, who bow'd beneath the force Of strictest discipline, severely wise, All human passions. Following him I see, As at Thermopylae he glorious fell, The firm devoted chief, who prov'd by deeds The hardest lesson which the other taught. Then Aristides lifts his honest front; Spotless of heart, to whom th' unflattering voice Of freedom gave the noblest name of Just; In pure majestic poverty rever'd; Who, ev'n his glory to his country's weal Submitting, swell'd a haughty rival's fame. Rear'd by his care, of softer ray appears Cimon, sweet-soul'd; whose genius, rising strong, Shook off the load of young debauch; abroad The scourge of Persian pride, at home the friend Of every worth and every splendid art; Modest and simple in the pomp of wealth. Of rougher front, a mighty people come, A race of heroes! in those virtuous times Which knew no stain, save that with partial flame Their dearest country they too fondly lov'd. Her better founder first, the Light of Rome, Numa, who soften'd her rapacious sons; Servius the king, who laid the solid base On which o'er earth the vast republic spread. Then the great consuls venerable rise: The public father who the private quell'd, As on the dread tribunal, sternly sad; He, whom his thankless country could not lose, Camillus, only vengeful to her foes; Fabricius, scorner of all-conquering gold, And Cincinnatus, awful from the plough; Thy willing victim, Carthage! bursting loose From all that pleading Nature could oppose, From a whole city's tears, by rigid faith Imperious call'd, and honour's dire command; Scipio, the gentle chief, humanely brave, Who soon the race of spotless glory ran, And, warm in youth, to the poetic shade With friendship and philosophy retir'd; Tully, whose powerful eloquence a while Restrain'd the rapid fate of rushing Rome; Unconquer'd Cato, virtuous in extreme; And thou, unhappy Brutus, kind of heart, Whose steady arm, by awful virtue urg'd, Lifted the Roman steel against thy friend. Thousands besides the tribute of a verse Demand; but who can count the stars of heaven. Who sing their influence on this lower world? Behold, who yonder comes! in sober state, Fair, mild, and strong as is a vernal sun: 'Tis Phoebus' self, or else the Mantuan swain! Great Homer too appears, of daring wing, Parent of song! and equal by his side, The British Muse; join'd hand in hand they walk, Darkling, full up the middle steep to fame. Nor absent are those shades, whose skilful hand Pathetic drew th' impassion'd heart, and charm'd Transported Athens with the moral scene; Nor those who, tuneful, wak'd th' enchanting lyre. First of your kind! society divine! Still visit thus my nights, for you reserv'd, And mount my soaring soul to thoughts like yours. Silence, thou lonely power! the door be thine; See on the hallow'd hour that none intrude, Save a few chosen friends, that sometimes deign To bless my humble roof, with sense refin'd, Learning digested well, exalted faith, Unstudied wit, and humour ever gay. Or from the Muses' hill will Pope descend, To raise the sacred hour, to bid it smile, And with the social spirit warm the heart; For, though not sweeter his own Homer sings, Yet is his life the more endearing song. The city swarms intense. The public haunt, Full of each theme and warm with mix'd discourse, Hums indistinct. The sons of riot flow Down the loose stream of false enchanted joy To swift destruction. On the rankled soul The gaming fury falls; and in one gulf Of total ruin, honour, virtue, peace, Friends, families, and fortune headlong sink. Up-springs the dance along the lighted dome, Mix'd and evolv'd a thousand sprightly ways. The glitt'ring court effuses every pomp; The circle deepens; beam'd with gaudy robes, Tapers, and sparkling gems, and radiant eyes, A soft effulgence o'er the palace waves: While a gay insect in his summer shine, The fop, light-flutt'ring, spreads his mealy wings. Dread o'er the scene the ghost of Hamlet stalks; Othello rages; poor Monimia mourns; And Belvidera pours her soul in love. Deep-thrilling terror shakes; the comely tear Steals o'er the cheek: or else the comic muse Holds to the world a picture of itself, And raises sly the fair impartial laugh. Sometimes she lifts her strain, and paints the scenes Of beauteous life; whate'er can deck mankind, Or charm the heart, in generous Bevil show'd. O thou, whose wisdom, solid yet refin'd, Whose patriot virtues, and consummate skill To touch the finer springs that move the world, Join'd to whate'er the graces can bestow, And all Apollo's animating fire, Give thee with pleasing dignity to shine At once the guardian, ornament, and joy Of polish'd life; permit the rural muse, O Chesterfield, to grace thee with her song. Ere to the shades again she humbly flies, Indulge her fond ambition, in thy train (For every muse has in thy train a place) To mark thy various full-accomplish'd mind, To mark that spirit which with British scorn Rejects th' allurements of corrupted power; That elegant politeness which excels, Ev'n in the judgment of presumptuous France, The boasted manners of her shining court; That wit, the vivid energy of sense, The truth of nature, which, with Attic point And kind well-temper'd satire, smoothly keen, Steals through the soul and without pain corrects. Or, rising thence with yet a brighter flame, O let me hail thee on some glorious day, When to the listening senate ardent crowd Britannia's sons to hear her pleaded cause! Then, dress'd by thee, more amiably fair, Truth the soft robe of mild persuasion wears; Thou to assenting reason giv'st again Her own enlighten'd thoughts; call'd from the heart, Th' obedient passions on thy voice attend; And ev'n reluctant party feels a while Thy gracious power, as through the varied maze Of eloquence, now smooth, now quick, now strong, Profound and clear, you roll the copious flood. To thy lov'd haunt return, my happy muse: For now, behold! the joyous Winter days, Frosty, succeed; and through the blue serene, For sight too fine, th' ethereal nitre flies, Killing infectious damps, and the spent air Storing afresh with elemental life. Close crowds the shining atmosphere; and binds Our strengthen'd bodies in its cold embrace, Constringent; feeds, and animates our blood; Refines our spirits, through the new-strung nerves In swifter sallies darting to the brain; Where sits the soul, intense, collected, cool, Bright as the skies, and as the season keen. All nature feels the renovating force Of Winter, only to the thoughtless eye In ruin seen. The frost-concocted glebe Draws in abundant vegetable soul, And gathers vigour for the coming year; A stronger glow sits on the lively cheek Of ruddy fire; and luculent along The purer rivers flow: their sullen deeps, Transparent, open to the shepherd's gaze, And murmur hoarser at the fixing frost. What art thou, frost? and whence are thy keen stores Deriv'd, thou secret all-invading power, Whom ev'n th' illusive fluid cannot fly? Is not thy potent energy, unseen, Myriads of little salts, or hook'd, or shap'd Like double wedges, and diffus'd immense Through water, earth, and ether? Hence at eve, Steam'd eager from the red horizon round, With the fierce rage of Winter deep suffus'd, An icy gale, oft shifting, o'er the pool Breathes a blue film, and in its mid-career Arrests the bickering stream. The loosen'd ice, Let down the flood and half dissolv'd by day, Rustles no more; but to the sedgy bank Fast grows, or gathers round the pointed stone, A crystal pavement, by the breath of heaven Cemented firm; till, seiz'd from shore to shore, The whole imprison'd river growls below. Loud rings the frozen earth, and hard reflects A double noise; while, at his evening watch, The village-dog deters the nightly thief; The heifer lows, the distant waterfall Swells in the breeze; and with the hasty tread Of traveller the hollow-sounding plain Shakes from afar. The full ethereal round, Infinite worlds disclosing to the view, Shines out intensely keen, and, all one cope Of starry glitter, glows from pole to pole. From pole to pole the rigid influence falls Through the still night, incessant, heavy, strong, And seizes nature fast. It freezes on, Till morn, late-rising o'er the drooping world, Lifts her pale eye unjoyous. Then appears The various labour of the silent night: Prone from the dripping eave, and dumb cascade, Whose idle torrents only seem to roar, The pendant icicle; the frost-work fair, Where transient hues and fancy'd figures rise; Wide-spouted o'er the hill the frozen brook, A livid tract, cold-gleaming on the morn; The forest bent beneath the plumy wave; And by the frost refin'd the whiter snow Incrusted hard, and sounding to the tread Of early shepherd, as he pensive seeks His pining flock, or from the mountain top, Pleas'd with the slippery surface, swift descends. 'Tis done! Dread Winter spreads his latest glooms, And reigns tremendous o'er the conquer'd year. How dead the vegetable kingdom lies! How dumb the tuneful! Horror wide extends His melancholy empire. Here, fond man! Behold thy pictur'd life; pass some few years, Thy flowering Spring, thy Summer's ardent strength, Thy sober Autumn fading into age, And pale concluding Winter comes at last And shuts the scene. Ah! whither now are fled Those dreams of greatness? those unsolid hopes Of happiness? those longings after fame? Those restless cares? those busy bustling days? Those gay-spent festive nights? those veering thoughts, Lost between good and ill, that shared thy life? All now are vanish'd! Virtue sole survives, Immortal, never-failing friend of man, His guide to happiness on high. And see! 'Tis come, the glorious morn! the second birth Of heaven and earth! awakening nature hears The new-creating word, and starts to life In every heighten'd form, from pain and death For ever free. The great eternal scheme, Involving all, and in a perfect whole Uniting, as the prospect wider spreads, To reason's eye refin'd clears up apace. Ye vainly wise! ye blind presumptuous! now, Confounded in the dust, adore that Power And Wisdom oft arraign'd: see now the cause Why unassuming worth in secret liv'd And died neglected: why the good man's share In life was gall and bitterness of soul: Why the lone widow and her orphans pin'd In starving solitude; while luxury In palaces lay straining her low thought To form unreal wants: why heaven-born truth And moderation fair wore the red marks Of superstition's scourge; why licens'd pain, That cruel spoiler, that embosom'd foe, Embitter'd all our bliss. Ye good distress'd! Ye noble few! who here unbending stand Beneath life's pressure, yet a little while, And what your bounded view, which only saw A little part, deem'd evil is no more: The storms of wintry time will quickly pass, And one unbounded Spring encircle all.

from The Seasons: Winter James Thomson Georgic?