III. AFTER dark vapours have oppress'd our plains Takes as a long-lost right the feel of May, 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. Jan. 1817. IV. WRITTEN ON THE BLANK SPACE OF A LEAF AT THE END OF CHAUCER'S TALE OF THE FLOWRE AND THE LEFE." THIS pleasant tale is like a little copse: Come cool and suddenly against his face, Could at this moment be content to lie Meekly upon the grass, as those whose sobbings Feb. 1817. ON THE SEA. 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 whence it sometime fell, Sit Aug. 1817. VI. 66 ON LEIGH HUNT'S POEM, THE STORY OF RIMINI." Who loves to peer up at the morning sun, Of Heaven-Hesperus-let him lowly speak Or moon, if that her hunting be begun. He who knows these delights, and too is prone Will find at once a region of his own, To alleys, where the fir-tree drops its cone, 1817 VII. WHEN I have fears that I may cease to be Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain, Before high piled books, in charact'ry, Hold like full garners the full-ripen'd grain; When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face, Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, And feel that I may never live to trace Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance; And when I feel, fair creature of an hour! That I shall never look upon thee more, Never have relish in the faery power Of unreflecting love!-then on the shore Of the wide world I stand alone, and think Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink. |