II O for a draught of vintage! that hath been Dance, and Provençal song, and sunburnt mirth! Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene, And purple-stainèd mouth ; That I might drink, and leave the world unseen, III 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, IV 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, Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown V I cannot see what flowers are at my feet, The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild; The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine, VI 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 musèd 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, Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain— VII Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird ! Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home, The same that oft-times hath Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam VIII Forlorn! the very word is like a bell To toll me back from thee to my sole self. Was it a vision or a waking dream? 157 INTO my heart an air that kills 158 Keats. From yon far country blows: What are those blue remember'd hills, That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, The happy highways where I went A. E. Housman. MUSIC, when soft voices die, Odours, when sweet violets sicken, Rose leaves, when the rose is dead, And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone, M Shelley. 159* Song of the Lotos-Eaters 1 THERE is sweet music here that softer falls Than tir'd eyelids upon tir'd eyes; Music that brings sweet sleep down from the blissful skies. Here are cool mosses deep, And thro' the moss the ivies creep, And in the stream the long-leaved flowers weep, 2 Why are we weigh'd upon with heaviness, And make perpetual moan, Still from one sorrow to another thrown : Nor ever fold our wings, And cease from wanderings, Nor steep our brows in slumber's holy balm ; Nor harken what the inner spirit sings, 'There is no joy but calm!' Why should we only toil, the roof and crown of things? 3 Lo! in the middle of the wood, The folded leaf is woo'd from out the bud With winds upon the branch, and there Lo! sweeten'd with the summer light, The full-juiced apple, waxing over-mellow, The flower ripens in its place, Ripens and fades, and falls, and hath no toil, Hateful is the dark-blue sky, Let us alone. Time driveth onward fast, In ever climbing up the climbing wave? All things have rest, and ripen toward the grave In silence; ripen, fall, and cease: Give us long rest or death, dark death, or dreamful ease. 5 How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream, With half-shut eyes ever to seem Falling asleep in a half-dream! |