What is more gentle than a wind in summer?

What is more soothing than the pretty hummer

That stays one moment in an open flower,

And buzzes cheerily from bower to bower?

What is more tranquil than a musk-rose blowing

In a green island, far from all men’s knowing?

More healthful than the leafiness of dales?

More secret than a nest of nightingales?

More serene than Cordelia’s countenance?

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More full of visions than a high romance?

What, but thee Sleep? Soft closer of our eyes!

Low murmurer of tender lullabies!

Light hoverer around our happy pillows!

Wreather of poppy buds, and weeping willows!

Silent entangler of a beauty’s tresses!

Most happy listener! when the morning blesses

Thee for enlivening all the cheerful eyes

That glance so brightly at the new sun-rise.

But what is higher beyond thought than thee?

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Fresher than berries of a mountain tree?

More strange, more beautiful, more smooth, more regal,

Than wings of swans, than doves, than dim-seen eagle?

What is it? And to what shall I compare it?

It has a glory, and naught else can share it:

The thought thereof is awful, sweet, and holy,

Chasing away all worldliness and folly;

Coming sometimes like fearful claps of thunder,

Or the low rumblings earth’s regions under;

And sometimes like a gentle whispering

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Of all the secrets of some wondrous thing

That breathes about us in the vacant air;

So that we look around with prying stare,

Perhaps to see shapes of light, aërial limning,

And catch soft floatings from a faint-heard hymning,

To see the laurel wreath, on high suspended,

That is to crown our name when life is ended.

Sometimes it gives a glory to the voice,

And from the heart up-springs, ‘Rejoice! Rejoice!’ –

Sounds which will reach the Framer of all things,

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And die away in ardent mutterings.

No one who once the glorious sun has seen,

And all the clouds, and felt his bosom clean

For his great Maker’s presence, but must know

What ’tis I mean, and feel his being glow:

Therefore no insult will I give his spirit,

By telling what he sees from native merit.

O Poesy! for thee I hold my pen

That am not yet a glorious denizen

Of thy wide heaven – Should I rather kneel

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Upon some mountain-top until I feel

A glowing splendour round about me hung,

And echo back the voice of thine own tongue?

O Poesy! for thee I grasp my pen

That am not yet a glorious denizen

Of thy wide heaven; yet, to my ardent prayer,

Yield from thy sanctuary some clear air,

Smoothed for intoxication by the breath

Of flowering bays, that I may die a death

Of luxury, and my young spirit follow

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The morning sunbeams to the great Apollo

Like a fresh sacrifice; or, if I can bear

The o’erwhelming sweets, ’twill bring to me the fair

Visions of all places: a bowery nook

Will be elysium – an eternal book

Whence I may copy many a lovely saying

About the leaves, and flowers – about the playing

Of nymphs in woods, and fountains; and the shade

Keeping a silence round a sleeping maid;

And many a verse from so strange influence

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That we must ever wonder how, and whence

It came. Also imaginings will hover

Round my fire-side, and haply there discover

Vistas of solemn beauty, where I’d wander

In happy silence, like the clear Meander

Through its lone vales; and where I found a spot

Of awfuller shade, or an enchanted grot,

Or a green hill o’erspread with chequered dress

Of flowers, and fearful from its loveliness,

Write on my tablets all that was permitted,

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All that was for our human senses fitted.

Then the events of this wide world I’d seize

Like a strong giant, and my spirit tease

Till at its shoulders it should proudly see

Wings to find out an immortality.

Stop and consider! life is but a day;

A fragile dew-drop on its perilous way

From a tree’s summit; a poor Indian’s sleep

While his boat hastens to the monstrous steep

Of Montmorenci. Why so sad a moan?

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Life is the rose’s hope while yet unblown;

The reading of an ever-changing tale;

The light uplifting of a maiden’s veil;

A pigeon tumbling in clear summer air;

A laughing school-boy, without grief or care,

Riding the springy branches of an elm.

O for ten years, that I may overwhelm

Myself in poesy; so I may do the deed

That my own soul has to itself decreed.

Then will I pass the countries that I see

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In long perspective, and continually

Taste their pure fountains. First the realm I’ll pass

Of Flora, and old Pan: sleep in the grass,

Feed upon apples red, and strawberries,

And choose each pleasure that my fancy sees;

Catch the white-handed nymphs in shady places,

To woo sweet kisses from averted faces –

Play with their fingers, touch their shoulders white

Into a pretty shrinking with a bite

As hard as lips can make it, till, agreed,

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A lovely tale of human life we’ll read.

And one will teach a tame dove how it best

May fan the cool air gently o’er my rest;

Another, bending o’er her nimble tread,

Will set a green robe floating round her head,

And still will dance with ever varied ease,

Smiling upon the flowers and the trees:

Another will entice me on, and on

Through almond blossoms and rich cinnamon;

Till in the bosom of a leafy world

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We rest in silence, like two gems upcurled

In the recesses of a pearly shell.

And can I ever bid these joys farewell?

Yes, I must pass them for a nobler life,

Where I may find the agonies, the strife

Of human hearts – for lo! I see afar,

O’er-sailing the blue cragginess, a car

And steeds with streamy manes – the charioteer

Looks out upon the winds with glorious fear:

And now the numerous tramplings quiver lightly

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Along a huge cloud’s ridge; and now with sprightly

Wheel downward come they into fresher skies,

Tipped round with silver from the sun’s bright eyes.

Still downward with capacious whirl they glide;

And now I see them on a green-hill’s side

In breezy rest among the nodding stalks.

The charioteer with wondrous gesture talks

To the trees and mountains; and there soon appear

Shapes of delight, of mystery, and fear,

Passing along before a dusky space

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Made by some mighty oaks: as they would chase

Some ever-fleeting music on they sweep.

Lo! how they murmur, laugh, and smile, and weep –

Some with upholden hand and mouth severe;

Some with their faces muffled to the ear

Between their arms; some, clear in youthful bloom,

Go glad and smilingly athwart the gloom;

Some looking back, and some with upward gaze;

Yes, thousands in a thousand different ways

Flit onward – now a lovely wreath of girls

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Dancing their sleek hair into tangled curls;

And now broad wings. Most awfully intent

The driver of those steeds is forward bent,

And seems to listen: O that I might know

All that he writes with such a hurrying glow.

The visions all are fled – the car is fled

Into the light of heaven, and in their stead

A sense of real things comes doubly strong,

And, like a muddy stream, would bear along

My soul to nothingness: but I will strive

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Against all doubtings, and will keep alive

The thought of that same chariot, and the strange

Journey it went.

Is there so small a range

In the present strength of manhood, that the high

Imagination cannot freely fly

As she was wont of old? Prepare her steeds,

Paw up against the light, and do strange deeds

Upon the clouds? Has she not shown us all?

From the clear space of ether, to the small

Breath of new buds unfolding? From the meaning

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Of Jove’s large eye-brow, to the tender greening

Of April meadows? Here her altar shone,

E’en in this isle; and who could paragon

The fervid choir that lifted up a noise

Of harmony, to where it aye will poise

Its mighty self of convoluting sound,

Huge as a planet, and like that roll round,

Eternally around a dizzy void?

Ay, in those days the Muses were nigh cloyed

With honours; nor had any other care

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Than to sing out and soothe their wavy hair.

Could all this be forgotten? Yes, a schism

Nurtured by foppery and barbarism,

Made great Apollo blush for this his land.

Men were thought wise who could not understand

His glories: with a puling infant’s force

They swayed about upon a rocking horse,

And thought it Pegasus. Ah, dismal souled!

The winds of heaven blew, the ocean rolled

Its gathering waves – ye felt it not. The blue

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Bared its eternal bosom, and the dew

Of summer nights collected still to make

The morning precious: beauty was awake!

Why were ye not awake? But ye were dead

To things ye knew not of – were closely wed

To musty laws lined out with wretched rule

And compass vile: so that ye taught a school

Of dolts to smooth, inlay, and clip, and fit,

Till, like the certain wands of Jacob’s wit,

Their verses tallied. Easy was the task:

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A thousand handicraftsmen wore the mask

Of Poesy. Ill-fated, impious race!

That blasphemed the bright Lyrist to his face,

And did not know it! No, they went about,

Holding a poor, decrepit standard out

Marked with most flimsy mottoes, and in large

The name of one Boileau!

O ye whose charge

It is to hover round our pleasant hills!

Whose congregated majesty so fills

My boundly reverence, that I cannot trace

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Your hallowed names, in this unholy place,

So near those common folk – did not their shames

Affright you? Did our old lamenting Thames

Delight you? Did ye never cluster round

Delicious Avon, with a mournful sound,

And weep? Or did ye wholly bid adieu

To regions where no more the laurel grew?

Or did ye stay to give a welcoming

To some lone spirits who could proudly sing

Their youth away, and die? ’Twas even so.

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But let me think away those times of woe:

Now ’tis a fairer season; ye have breathed

Rich benedictions o’er us; ye have wreathed

Fresh garlands: for sweet music has been heard

In many places – some has been upstirred

From out its crystal dwelling in a lake,

By a swan’s ebon bill; from a thick brake,

Nested and quiet in a valley mild,

Bubbles a pipe – fine sounds are floating wild

About the earth: happy are ye and glad.

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These things are doubtless: yet in truth we’ve had

Strange thunders from the potency of song;

Mingled indeed with what is sweet and strong,

From majesty: but in clear truth the themes

Are ugly clubs, the poets Polyphemes

Disturbing the grand sea. A drainless shower

Of light is Poesy; ’tis the supreme of power;

’Tis might half-slumbering on its own right arm.

The very archings of her eye-lids charm

A thousand willing agents to obey,

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And still she governs with the mildest sway:

But strength alone, though of the Muses born,

Is like a fallen angel: trees uptorn,

Darkness, and worms, and shrouds, and sepulchres

Delight it; for it feeds upon the burrs,

And thorns of life; forgetting the great end

Of Poesy, that it should be a friend

To soothe the cares, and lift the thoughts of man.

Yet I rejoice: a myrtle fairer than

E’er grew in Paphos, from the bitter weeds

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Lifts its sweet head into the air, and feeds

A silent space with ever sprouting green.

All tenderest birds there find a pleasant screen,

Creep through the shade with jaunty fluttering,

Nibble the little cuppèd flowers and sing.

Then let us clear away the choking thorns

From round its gentle stem; let the young fawns,

Yeaned in after times, when we are flown,

Find a fresh sward beneath it, overgrown

With simple flowers: let there nothing be

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More boisterous than a lover’s bended knee;

Naught more ungentle than the placid look

Of one who leans upon a closèd book;

Naught more untranquil than the grassy slopes

Between two hills. All hail delightful hopes!

As she was wont, th’ imagination

Into most lovely labyrinths will be gone,

And they shall be accounted poet-kings

Who simply tell the most heart-easing things.

O may these joys be ripe before I die.

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Will not some say that I presumptuously

Have spoken? that from hastening disgrace

‘Twere better far to hide my foolish face?

That whining boyhood should with reverence bow

Ere the dread thunderbolt could reach? How!

If I do hide myself, it sure shall be

In the very fane, the light of Poesy:

If I do fall, at least I will be laid

Beneath the silence of a poplar shade;

And over me the grass shall be smooth-shaven;

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And there shall be a kind memorial graven.

But off, Despondence! miserable bane!

They should not know thee, who, athirst to gain

A noble end, are thirsty every hour.

What though I am not wealthy in the dower

Of spanning wisdom; though I do not know

The shiftings of the mighty winds that blow

Hither and thither all the changing thoughts

Of man: though no great minist’ring reason sorts

Out the dark mysteries of human souls

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To clear conceiving – yet there ever rolls

A vast idea before me, and I glean

Therefrom my liberty; thence too I’ve seen

The end and aim of Poesy. ’Tis clear

As any thing most true; as that the year

Is made of the four seasons – manifest

As a large cross, some old cathedral’s crest,

Lifted to the white clouds. Therefore should I

Be but the essence of deformity,

A coward, did my very eye-lids wink

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At speaking out what I have dared to think.

Ah! rather let me like a madman run

Over some precipice! let the hot sun

Melt my Dedalian wings, and drive me down

Convulsed and headlong! Stay! an inward frown

Of conscience bids me be more calm awhile.

An ocean dim, sprinkled with many an isle,

Spreads awfully before me. How much toil!

How many days! what desperate turmoil!

Ere I can have explored its widenesses.

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Ah, what a task! upon my bended knees,

I could unsay those – no, impossible!

Impossible!

For sweet relief I’ll dwell

On humbler thoughts, and let this strange assay

Begun in gentleness die so away.

E’en now all tumult from my bosom fades:

I turn full-hearted to the friendly aids

That smooth the path of honour; brotherhood,

And friendliness the nurse of mutual good.

The hearty grasp that sends a pleasant sonnet

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Into the brain ere one can think upon it;

The silence when some rhymes are coming out;

And when they’re come, the very pleasant rout:

The message certain to be done to-morrow –

’Tis perhaps as well that it should be to borrow

Some precious book from out its snug retreat,

To cluster round it when we next shall meet.

Scarce can I scribble on; for lovely airs

Are fluttering round the room like doves in pairs;

Many delights of that glad day recalling,

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When first my senses caught their tender falling.

And with these airs come forms of elegance

Stooping their shoulders o’er a horse’s prance,

Careless, and grand – fingers soft and round

Parting luxuriant curls – and the swift bound

Of Bacchus from his chariot, when his eye

Made Ariadne’s cheek look blushingly.

Thus I remember all the pleasant flow

Of words at opening a portfolio.

Things such as these are ever harbingers

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To trains of peaceful images: the stirs

Of a swan’s neck unseen among the rushes;

A linnet starting all about the bushes;

A butterfly, with golden wings broad parted,

Nestling a rose, convulsed as though it smarted

With over-pleasure – many, many more,

Might I indulge at large in all my store

Of luxuries: yet I must not forget

Sleep, quiet with his poppy coronet,

For what there may be worthy in these rhymes

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I partly owe to him: and thus, the chimes

Of friendly voices had just given place

To as sweet a silence, when I ’gan retrace

The pleasant day, upon a couch at ease.

It was a poet’s house who keeps the keys

Of Pleasure’s temple. Round about were hung

The glorious features of the bards who sung

In other ages – cold and sacred busts

Smiled at each other. Happy he who trusts

To clear Futurity his darling fame!

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Then there were fauns and satyrs taking aim

At swelling apples with a frisky leap

And reaching fingers, ’mid a luscious heap

Of vine leaves. Then there rose to view a fane

Of liny marble, and thereto a train

Of nymphs approaching fairly o’er the sward:

One, loveliest, holding her white hand toward

The dazzling sun-rise: two sisters sweet

Bending their graceful figures till they meet

Over the trippings of a little child:

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And some are hearing, eagerly, the wild

Thrilling liquidity of dewy piping.

See, in another picture, nymphs are wiping

Cherishingly Diana’s timorous limbs –

A fold of lawny mantle dabbling swims

At the bath’s edge, and keeps a gentle motion

With the subsiding crystal, as when ocean

Heaves calmly its broad swelling smoothness o’er

Its rocky marge, and balances once more

The patient weeds, that now unshent by foam

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Feel all about their undulating home.

Sappho’s meek head was there half smiling down

At nothing; just as though the earnest frown

Of over-thinking had that moment gone

From off her brow, and left her all alone.

Great Alfred’s too, with anxious, pitying eyes,

As if he always listened to the sighs

Of the goaded world; and Kosciusko’s worn

By horrid sufferance – mightily forlorn.

Petrarch, outstepping from the shady green,

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Starts at the sight of Laura; nor can wean

His eyes from her sweet face. Most happy they!

For over them was seen a free display

Of out-spread wings, and from between them shone

The face of Poesy: from off her throne

She overlooked things that I scarce could tell.

The very sense of where I was might well

Keep Sleep aloof: but more than that there came

Thought after thought to nourish up the flame

Within my breast; so that the morning light

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Surprised me even from a sleepless night;

And up I rose refreshed, and glad, and gay,

Resolving to begin that very day

These lines; and howsoever they be done,

I leave them as a father does his son.

The church bells toll a melancholy round,

Calling the people to some other prayers,

Some other gloominess, more dreadful cares,

More hearkening to the sermon’s horrid sound.

Surely the mind of man is closely bound

In some black spell; seeing that each one tears

Himself from fireside joys, and Lydian airs,

And converse high of those with glory crowned.

Still, still they toll, and I should feel a damp –

10

A chill as from a tomb – did I not know

That they are dying like an outburnt lamp;

That ’tis their sighing, wailing ere they go

Into oblivion – that fresh flowers will grow,

And many glories of immortal stamp.

The poetry of earth is never dead:

When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,

And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run

From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead –

That is the Grasshopper’s. He takes the lead

In summer luxury; he has never done

With his delights, for when tired out with fun

He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.

The poetry of earth is ceasing never:

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On a lone winter evening, when the frost

Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills

The Cricket’s song, in warmth increasing ever,

And seems to one in drowsiness half lost,

The Grasshopper’s among some grassy hills.

Good Kosciusko, thy great name alone

Is a full harvest whence to reap high feeling;

It comes upon us like the glorious pealing

Of the wide spheres – an everlasting tone.

And now it tells me, that in worlds unknown,

The names of heroes burst from clouds concealing,

And change to harmonies, for ever stealing

Through cloudless blue, and round each silver throne.

It tells me too, that on a happy day,

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When some good spirit walks upon the earth,

Thy name with Alfred’s and the great of yore

Gently commingling, gives tremendous birth

To a loud hymn, that sounds far, far away

To where the great God lives for evermore.

Nymph of the downward smile, and sidelong glance,

In what diviner moments of the day

Art thou most lovely? – When gone far astray

Into the labyrinths of sweet utterance?

Or when serenely wandering in a trance

Of sober thought? – Or when starting away,

With careless robe, to meet the morning ray,

Thou spar’st the flowers in thy mazy dance?

Haply ’tis when thy ruby lips part sweetly,

10

And so remain, because thou listenest:

But thou to please wert nurtured so completely

That I can never tell what mood is best.

I shall as soon pronounce which Grace more neatly

Trips it before Apollo than the rest.

Happy is England! I could be content

To see no other verdure than its own;

To feel no other breezes than are blown

Through its tall woods with high romances blent:

Yet do I sometimes feel a languishment

For skies Italian, and an inward groan

To sit upon an Alp as on a throne,

And half forget what world or worldling meant.

Happy is England, sweet her artless daughters;

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Enough their simple loveliness for me,

Enough their whitest arms in silence clinging:

Yet do I often warmly burn to see

Beauties of deeper glance, and hear their singing,

And float with them about the summer waters.

After dark vapours have oppressed our plains

For a long dreary season, comes a day

Born of the gentle South, and clears away

From the sick heavens all unseemly stains.

The anxious month, relieving from its pains,

Takes as a long-lost right the feel of May,

The eyelids with the passing coolness play,

Like rose leaves with the drip of summer rains.

And calmest thoughts come round us – as of leaves

10

Budding – fruit ripening in stillness – autumn suns

Smiling at eve upon the quiet sheaves –

Sweet Sappho’s cheek – a sleeping infant’s breath –

The gradual sand that through an hour-glass runs –

A woodland rivulet – a Poet’s death.

Glory and loveliness have passed away;

For if we wander out in early morn,

No wreathèd incense do we see upborne

Into the east, to meet the smiling day:

No crowd of nymphs soft voiced and young, and gay,

In woven baskets bringing ears of corn,

Roses, and pinks, and violets, to adorn

The shrine of Flora in her early May.

But there are left delights as high as these,

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And I shall ever bless my destiny,

That in a time, when under pleasant trees

Pan is no longer sought, I feel a free,

A leafy luxury, seeing I could please

With these poor offerings, a man like thee.

This pleasant tale is like a little copse:

The honeyed lines do freshly interlace

To keep the reader in so sweet a place,

So that he here and there full-hearted stops;

And oftentimes he feels the dewy drops

Come cool and suddenly against his face,

And by the wandering melody may trace

Which way the tender-leggèd linnet hops.

Oh! what a power has white simplicity!

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What mighty power has this gentle story!

I that do ever feel athirst for glory

Could at this moment be content to lie

Meekly upon the grass, as those whose sobbings

Were heard of none beside the mournful robins.

Minutes are flying swiftly, and as yet

Nothing unearthly has enticed my brain

Into a delphic labyrinth – I would fain

Catch an immortal thought to pay the debt

I owe to the kind poet who has set

Upon my ambitious head a glorious gain.

Two bending laurel sprigs – ’tis nearly pain

To be conscious of such a coronet.

Still time is fleeting, and no dream arises

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Gorgeous as I would have it; only I see

A trampling down of what the world most prizes,

Turbans and crowns, and blank regality –

And then I run into most wild surmises

Of all the many glories that may be.

What is there in the universal Earth

More lovely than a wreath from the bay tree?

Haply a halo round the moon – a glee

Circling from three sweet pair of lips in mirth;

And haply you will say the dewy birth

Of morning roses – ripplings tenderly

Spread by the halcyon’s breath upon the sea –

But these comparisons are nothing worth.

Then is there nothing in the world so fair?

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The silvery tears of April? Youth of May?

Or June that breathes out life for butterflies?

No – none of these can from my favourite bear

Away the palm – yet shall it ever pay

Due reverence to your most sovereign eyes.

God of the golden bow,

And of the golden lyre,

And of the golden hair,

And of the golden fire,

Charioteer

Round the patient year,

Where – where slept thine ire,

When like a blank idiot I put on thy wreath,

Thy laurel, thy glory,

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The light of thy story,

Or was I a worm – too low-creeping, for death?

O Delphic Apollo!

The Thunderer grasped and grasped,

The Thunderer frowned and frowned;

The eagle’s feathery mane

For wrath became stiffened – the sound

Of breeding thunder

Went drowsily under,

Muttering to be unbound.

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O why didst thou pity, and beg for a worm?

Why touch thy soft lute

Till the thunder was mute,

Why was I not crush’d – such a pitiful germ?

O Delphic Apollo!

The Pleiades were up,

Watching the silent air;

The seeds and roots in Earth

Were swelling for summer fare;

The Ocean, its neighbour,

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Was at his old labour,

When, who – who did dare

To tie for a moment thy plant round his brow,

And grin and look proudly,

And blaspheme so loudly,

And live for that honour, to stoop to thee now?

O Delphic Apollo!

My spirit is too weak – mortality

Weighs heavily on me like unwilling sleep,

And each imagined pinnacle and steep

Of godlike hardship, tells me I must die

Like a sick Eagle looking at the sky.

Yet ’tis a gentle luxury to weep

That I have not the cloudy winds to keep

Fresh for the opening of the morning’s eye.

Such dim-conceivèd glories of the brain

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Bring round the heart an undescribable feud;

So do these wonders a most dizzy pain,

That mingles Grecian grandeur with the rude

Wasting of old Time – with a billowy main –

A sun – a shadow of a magnitude.

Haydon! forgive me that I cannot speak

Definitively on these mighty things;

Forgive me that I have not Eagle’s wings –

That what I want I know not where to seek:

And think that I would not be over-meek

In rolling out up-followed thunderings,

Even to the steep of Heliconian springs,

Were I of ample strength for such a freak –

Think too, that all those numbers should be thine;

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Whose else? In this who touch thy vesture’s hem?

For when men stared at what was most divine

With browless idiotism – o’erwise phlegm –

Thou hadst beheld the Hesperian shine

Of their star in the East, and gone to worship them.

Who loves to peer up at the morning sun,

With half-shut eyes and comfortable cheek,

Let him, with this sweet tale, full often seek

For meadows where the little rivers run;

Who loves to linger with that brightest one

Of Heaven – Hesperus – let him lowly speak

These numbers to the night, and starlight meek,

Or moon, if that her hunting be begun.

He who knows these delights, and too is prone

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To moralise upon a smile or tear,

Will find at once a region of his own,

A bower for his spirit, and will steer

To alleys, where the fir-tree drops its cone,

Where robins hop, and fallen leaves are sear.

Come hither all sweet maidens soberly,

Down-looking – ay, and with a chastened light

Hid in the fringes of your eyelids white,

And meekly let your fair hands joinèd be.

Are ye so gentle that ye could not see,

Untouched, a victim of your beauty bright –

Sinking away to his young spirit’s night,

Sinking bewildered ’mid the dreary sea:

’Tis young Leander toiling to his death.

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Nigh swooning, he doth purse his weary lips

For Hero’s cheek, and smiles against her smile.

O horrid dream! see how his body dips

Dead-heavy; arms and shoulders gleam awhile:

He’s gone: up bubbles all his amorous breath!

It keeps eternal whisperings around

Desolate shores, and with its mighty swell

Gluts twice ten thousand caverns, till the spell

Of Hecate leaves them their old shadowy sound.

Often ’tis in such gentle temper found,

That scarcely will the very smallest shell

Be moved for days from where it sometime fell,

When last the winds of Heaven were unbound.

Oh ye! who have your eye-balls vexed and tired,

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Feast them upon the wideness of the Sea –

Oh ye! whose ears are dinned with uproar rude,

Or fed too much with cloying melody –

Sit ye near some old cavern’s mouth and brood

Until ye start, as if the sea-nymphs quired!

Unfelt, unheard, unseen,

I’ve left my little queen,

Her languid arms in silver slumber lying:

Ah! through their nestling touch,

Who – who could tell how much

There is for madness – cruel, or complying?

Those faery lids how sleek!

Those lips how moist! – they speak,

In ripest quiet, shadows of sweet sounds:

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Into my fancy’s ear

Melting a burden dear,

How ‘Love doth know no fullness nor no bounds.’

True! – tender monitors!

I bend unto your laws:

This sweetest day for dalliance was born!

So, without more ado,

I’ll feel my heaven anew,

For all the blushing of the hasty morn.

I

You say you love; but with a voice

Chaster than a nun’s, who singeth

The soft Vespers to herself

While the chime-bell ringeth –

O love me truly!

II

You say you love; but with a smile

Cold as sunrise in September,

As you were Saint Cupid’s nun,

And kept his weeks of Ember.

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O love me truly!

III

You say you love – but then your lips

Coral tinted teach no blisses

More than coral in the sea –

They never pout for kisses –

O love me truly!

IV

You say you love; but then your hand

No soft squeeze for squeeze returneth,

It is like a statue’s, dead –

While mine for passion burneth –

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O love me truly!

V

O breathe a word or two of fire!

Smile, as if those words should burn me,

Squeeze as lovers should – O kiss

And in thy heart inurn me!

O love me truly!

Hither, hither, love –

’Tis a shady mead –

Hither, hither, love,

Let us feed and feed!

Hither, hither, sweet –

’Tis a cowslip bed –

Hither, hither, sweet!

’Tis with dew bespread!

Hither, hither, dear –

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By the breath of life –

Hither, hither, dear!

Be the summer’s wife!

Though one moment’s pleasure

In one moment flies,

Though the passion’s treasure

In one moment dies;

Yet it has not passed –

Think how near, how near! –

And while it doth last,

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Think how dear, how dear!

Hither, hither, hither,

Love this boon has sent –

If I die and wither

I shall die content.

The Gothic looks solemn –

The plain Doric column

Supports an old Bishop and crosier;

The mouldering arch,

Shaded o’er by a larch

Stands next door to Wilson the Hosier.

Vicè – that is, by turns –

O’er pale faces mourns

The black-tassled trencher and common hat;

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The chantry boy sings,

The steeple bell rings,

And as for the Chancellor – dominat.

There are plenty of trees,

And plenty of ease,

And plenty of fat deer for parsons;

And when it is venison,

Short is the benison –

Then each on a leg or thigh fastens.

Think not of it, sweet one, so –

Give it not a tear;

Sigh thou mayst, and bid it go

Any, any where.

Do not look so sad, sweet one –

Sad and fadingly;

Shed one drop, then it is gone,

O ’twas born to die.

Still so pale? then, dearest, weep –

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Weep, I’ll count the tears,

And each one shall be a bliss

For thee in after years.

Brighter has it left thine eyes

Than a sunny rill;

And thy whispering melodies

Are tenderer still.

Yet – as all things mourn awhile

At fleeting blisses,

E’en let us too! but be our dirge

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A dirge of kisses.

BOOK I

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:

Its loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness; but still will keep

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing

A flowery band to bind us to the earth,

Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth

Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,

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Of all the unhealthy and o’er-darkened ways

Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,

Some shape of beauty moves away the pall

From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,

Trees old, and young, sprouting a shady boon

For simple sheep; and such are daffodils

With the green world they live in; and clear rills

That for themselves a cooling covert make

‘Gainst the hot season; the mid forest brake,

Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:

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And such too is the grandeur of the dooms

We have imagined for the mighty dead;

All lovely tales that we have heard or read –

An endless fountain of immortal drink,

Pouring unto us from the heaven’s brink.

Nor do we merely feel these essences

For one short hour; no, even as the trees

That whisper round a temple become soon

Dear as the temple’s self, so does the moon,

The passion poesy, glories infinite,

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Haunt us till they become a cheering light

Unto our souls, and bound to us so fast,

That, whether there be shine, or gloom o’ercast,

They alway must be with us, or we die.

Therefore, ’tis with full happiness that I

Will trace the story of Endymion.

The very music of the name has gone

Into my being, and each pleasant scene

Is growing fresh before me as the green

Of our own valleys: so I will begin

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Now while I cannot hear the city’s din;

Now while the early budders are just new,

And run in mazes of the youngest hue

About old forests; while the willow trails

Its delicate amber; and the dairy pails

Bring home increase of milk. And, as the year

Grows lush in juicy stalks, I’ll smoothly steer

My little boat, for many quiet hours,

With streams that deepen freshly into bowers.

Many and many a verse I hope to write,

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Before the daisies, vermeil-rimmed and white,

Hide in deep herbage; and ere yet the bees

Hum about globes of clover and sweet peas,

I must be near the middle of my story.

O may no wintry season, bare and hoary,

See it half finished; but let Autumn bold,

With universal tinge of sober gold,

Be all about me when I make an end.

And now at once, adventuresome, I send

My herald thought into a wilderness –

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There let its trumpet blow, and quickly dress

My uncertain path with green, that I may speed

Easily onward, thorough flowers and weed.

Upon the sides of Latmos was outspread

A mighty forest; for the moist earth fed

So plenteously all weed-hidden roots

Into o’er-hanging boughs, and precious fruits.

And it had gloomy shades, sequestered deep,

Where no man went; and if from shepherd’s keep

A lamb strayed far a-down those inmost glens,

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Never again saw he the happy pens

Whither his brethren, bleating with content,

Over the hills at every nightfall went.

Among the shepherds, ’twas believèd ever,

That not one fleecy lamb which thus did sever

From the white flock, but passed unworrièd

By angry wolf, or pard with prying head,

Until it came to some unfooted plains

Where fed the herds of Pan – aye great his gains

Who thus one lamb did lose. Paths there were many,

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Winding through palmy fern, and rushes fenny,

And ivy banks; all leading pleasantly

To a wide lawn, whence one could only see

Stems thronging all around between the swell

Of turf and slanting branches: who could tell

The freshness of the space of heaven above,

Edged round with dark tree tops? through which a dove

Would often beat its wings, and often too

A little cloud would move across the blue.

Full in the middle of this pleasantness

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There stood a marble altar, with a tress

Of flowers budded newly; and the dew

Had taken fairy fantasies to strew

Daisies upon the sacred sward last eve,

And so the dawnèd light in pomp receive.

For ’twas the morn: Apollo’s upward fire

Made every eastern cloud a silvery pyre

Of brightness so unsullied, that therein

A melancholy spirit well might win

Oblivion, and melt out his essence fine

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Into the winds: rain-scented eglantine

Gave temperate sweets to that well-wooing sun;

The lark was lost in him; cold springs had run

To warm their chilliest bubbles in the grass;

Man’s voice was on the mountains; and the mass

Of nature’s lives and wonders pulsed tenfold,

To feel this sun-rise and its glories old.

Now while the silent workings of the dawn

Were busiest, into that self-same lawn

All suddenly, with joyful cries, there sped

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A troop of little children garlanded;

Who gathering round the altar, seemed to pry

Earnestly round, as wishing to espy

Some folk of holiday: nor had they waited

For many moments, ere their ears were sated

With a faint breath of music, which even then

Filled out its voice, and died away again.

Within a little space again it gave

Its airy swellings, with a gentle wave,

To light-hung leaves, in smoothest echoes breaking

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Through copse-clad valleys – ere their death, o’ertaking

The surgy murmurs of the lonely sea.

And now, as deep into the wood as we

Might mark a lynx’s eye, there glimmered light

Fair faces and a rush of garments white,

Plainer and plainer showing, till at last

Into the widest alley they all passed,

Making directly for the woodland altar.

O kindly muse! let not my weak tongue falter

In telling of this goodly company,

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Of their old piety, and of their glee:

But let a portion of ethereal dew

Fall on my head, and presently unmew

My soul – that I may dare, in wayfaring,

To stammer where old Chaucer used to sing.

Leading the way, young damsels danced along,

Bearing the burden of a shepherd song;

Each having a white wicker over-brimmed

With April’s tender younglings; next, well trimmed,

A crowd of shepherds with as sunburnt looks

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As may be read of in Arcadian books,

Such as sat listening round Apollo’s pipe,

When the great deity, for earth too ripe,

Let his divinity o’erflowing die

In music, through the vales of Thessaly;

Some idly trailed their sheep-hooks on the ground,

And some kept up a shrilly mellow sound

With ebon-tippèd flutes; close after these,

Now coming from beneath the forest trees,

A venerable priest full soberly,

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Begirt with ministering looks: alway his eye

Steadfast upon the matted turf he kept,

And after him his sacred vestments swept.

From his right hand there swung a vase, milk-white,

Of mingled wine, out-sparkling generous light;

And in his left he held a basket full

Of all sweet herbs that searching eye could cull:

Wild thyme, and valley-lilies whiter still

Than Leda’s love, and cresses from the rill.

His agèd head, crownèd with beechen wreath,

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Seemed like a poll of ivy in the teeth

Of winter hoar. Then came another crowd

Of shepherds, lifting in due time aloud

Their share of the ditty. After them appeared,

Up-followed by a multitude that reared

Their voices to the clouds, a fair-wrought car,

Easily rolling so as scarce to mar

The freedom of three steeds of dapple brown.

Who stood therein did seem of great renown

Among the throng. His youth was fully blown,

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Showing like Ganymede to manhood grown;

And, for those simple times, his garments were

A chieftain king’s: beneath his breast, half bare,

Was hung a silver bugle, and between

His nervy knees there lay a boar-spear keen.

A smile was on his countenance; he seemed,

To common lookers-on, like one who dreamed

Of idleness in groves Elysian:

But there were some who feelingly could scan

A lurking trouble in his nether lip,

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And see that oftentimes the reins would slip

Through his forgotten hands: then would they sigh,

And think of yellow leaves, of owlet’s cry,

Of logs piled solemnly. Ah, well-a-day.

Why should our young Endymion pine away?

Soon the assembly, in a circle ranged,

Stood silent round the shrine: each look was changed

To sudden veneration: women meek

Beckoned their sons to silence; while each cheek

Of virgin bloom paled gently for slight fear.

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Endymion too, without a forest peer,

Stood, wan, and pale, and with an awèd face,

Among his brothers of the mountain chase.

In midst of all, the venerable priest

Eyed them with joy from greatest to the least,

And, after lifting up his agèd hands,

Thus spake he: ‘Men of Latmos! shepherd bands!

Whose care it is to guard a thousand flocks:

Whether descended from beneath the rocks

That overtop your mountains; whether come

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From valleys where the pipe is never dumb;

Or from your swelling downs, where sweet air stirs

Blue hare-bells lightly, and where prickly furze

Buds lavish gold; or ye, whose precious charge

Nibble their fill at ocean’s very marge,

Whose mellow reeds are touched with sounds forlorn

By the dim echoes of old Triton’s horn;

Mothers and wives! who day by day prepare

The scrip, with needments, for the mountain air;

And all ye gentle girls who foster up

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Udderless lambs, and in a little cup

Will put choice honey for a favoured youth –

Yea, every one attend! for in good truth

Our vows are wanting to our great god Pan.

Are not our lowing heifers sleeker than

Night-swollen mushrooms? Are not our wide plains

Speckled with countless fleeces? Have not rains

Greened over April’s lap? No howling sad

Sickens our fearful ewes; and we have had

Great bounty from Endymion our lord.

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The earth is glad: the merry lark has poured

His early song against yon breèzy sky,

That spreads so clear o’er our solemnity.’

Thus ending, on the shrine he heaped a spire

Of teeming sweets, enkindling sacred fire;

Anon he stained the thick and spongy sod

With wine, in honour of the shepherd-god.

Now while the earth was drinking it, and while

Bay leaves were crackling in the fragrant pile,

And gummy frankincense was sparkling bright

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’Neath smothering parsley, and a hazy light

Spread greyly eastward, thus a chorus sang:

‘O thou, whose mighty palace roof doth hang

From jagged trunks, and overshadoweth

Eternal whispers, glooms, the birth, life, death

Of unseen flowers in heavy peacefulness;

Who lov’st to see the hamadryads dress

Their ruffled locks where meeting hazels darken;

And through whole solemn hours dost sit, and hearken

The dreary melody of bedded reeds

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In desolate places, where dank moisture breeds

The pipy hemlock to strange overgrowth;

Bethinking thee, how melancholy loth

Thou wast to lose fair Syrinx – do thou now –

By thy love’s milky brow! –

By all the trembling mazes that she ran –

Hear us, great Pan!

‘O thou, for whose soul-soothing quiet, turtles

Passion their voices cooingly ’mong myrtles,

What time thou wanderest at eventide

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Through sunny meadows, that outskirt the side

Of thine enmossèd realms: O thou, to whom

Broad-leavèd fig trees even now foredoom

Their ripened fruitage; yellow-girted bees

Their golden honeycombs; our village leas

Their fairest-blossomed beans and poppied corn;

The chuckling linnet its five young unborn

To sing for thee; low creeping strawberries

Their summer coolness; pent up butterflies

Their freckled wings; yea, the fresh budding year

260 All its completions – be quickly near,

By every wind that nods the mountain pine,

O forester divine!

‘Thou, to whom every faun and satyr flies

For willing service; whether to surprise

The squatted hare while in half-sleeping fit;

Or upward ragged precipices flit

To save poor lambkins from the eagle’s maw;

Or by mysterious enticement draw

Bewildered shepherds to their path again;

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Or to tread breathless round the frothy main,

And gather up all fancifullest shells

For thee to tumble into Naiads’ cells,

And, being hidden, laugh at their out-peeping;

Or to delight thee with fantastic leaping,

The while they pelt each other on the crown

With silvery oak apples, and fir cones brown –

By all the echoes that about thee ring,

Hear us, O satyr king!

‘O Hearkener to the loud clapping shears

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While ever and anon to his shorn peers

A ram goes bleating; Winder of the horn,

When snouted wild-boars routing tender corn

Anger our huntsmen; Breather round our farms,

To keep off mildews, and all weather harms;

Strange ministrant of undescribèd sounds,

That come a-swooning over hollow grounds,

And wither drearily on barren moors;

Dread opener of the mysterious doors

Leading to universal knowledge – see,

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Great son of Dryope,

The many that are come to pay their vows

With leaves about their brows!

‘Be still the unimaginable lodge

For solitary thinkings; such as dodge

Conception to the very bourne of heaven,

Then leave the naked brain; be still the leaven,

That spreading in this dull and clodded earth

Gives it a touch ethereal – a new birth;

Be still a symbol of immensity;

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A firmament reflected in a sea;

An element filling the space between,

An unknown – but no more! we humbly screen

With uplift hands our foreheads, lowly bending,

And giving out a shout most heaven rending,

Conjure thee to receive our humble paean,

Upon thy Mount Lycean!’

Even while they brought the burden to a close,

A shout from the whole multitude arose,

That lingered in the air like dying rolls

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Of abrupt thunder, when Ionian shoals

Of dolphins bob their noses through the brine.

Meantime, on shady levels, mossy fine,

Young companies nimbly began dancing

To the swift treble pipe, and humming string.

Ay, those fair living forms swam heavenly

To tunes forgotten – out of memory;

Fair creatures! whose young children’s children bred

Thermopylae its heroes – not yet dead,

But in old marbles ever beautiful.

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High genitors, unconscious did they cull

Time’s sweet first-fruits – they danced to weariness,

And then in quiet circles did they press

The hillock turf, and caught the latter end

Of some strange history, potent to send

A young mind from its bodily tenement.

Or they might watch the quoit-pitchers, intent

On either side; pitying the sad death

Of Hyacinthus, when the cruel breath

Of Zephyr slew him – Zephyr penitent,

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Who now, ere Phoebus mounts the firmament,

Fondles the flower amid the sobbing rain.

The archers too, upon a wider plain,

Beside the feathery whizzing of the shaft,

And the dull twanging bowstring, and the raft

Branch down sweeping from a tall ash top,

Called up a thousand thoughts to envelop

Those who would watch.