To the Poet Coleridge

                   -- Mary Robinson 

RAPT in the visionary theme!

SPIRIT DIVINE! with THEE I'll wander,

Where the blue, wavy, lucid stream,

'Mid forest glooms, shall slow meander!

With THEE I'll trace the circling bounds

Of thy NEW PARADISE extended;

And listen to the varying sounds

Of winds, and foamy torrents blended.

 

Now by the source which lab'ring heaves

The mystic fountain, bubbling, panting,

While Gossamer its net-work weaves,

Adown the blue lawn slanting!

I'll mark thy sunny dome, and view

Thy Caves of Ice, thy fields of dew!

Thy ever-blooming mead, whose flow'r

Waves to the cold breath of the moonlight hour!

Or when the day-star, peering bright

On the grey wing of parting night;

While more than vegetating pow'r

Throbs grateful to the burning hour,

As summer's whisper'd sighs unfold

Her million, million buds of gold;

Then will I climb the breezy bounds,

Of thy NEW PARADISE extended,

And listen to the distant sounds

Of winds, and foamy torrents blended!

 

SPIRIT DIVINE! With THEE I'll trace

Imagination's boundless space

With thee, beneath thy sunny dome,

I'll listen to the minstrel's lay,

Hymning, the gradual close of day;

In Caves of Ice enchanted roam,

Where on the glitt'ring entrance plays

The moon's-beam with its silv'ry rays;

Or, when glassy stream,

That thro' the deep dell flows,

Flashes the noon's hot beam;

The noon's hot beam, that midway shows

Thy flaming Temple, studded o'er

With all PERUVIA'S lustrous store!

There will I trace the circling bounds

Of thy NEW PARADISE extended!

And listen to the awful sounds,

Of winds, and foamy torrents blended!

 

And now I'll pause to catch the moan

Of distant breezes, cavern-pent;

Now, ere the twilight tints are flown,

Purpling the landscape, far and wide,

On the dark promontory's side

I'll gather wild flow'rs, dew besprent,

And weave a crown for THEE,

GENIUS OF HEAV'N-TAUGHT POESY!

While, op'ning to my wond'ring eyes,

Thou bidst a new creation rise,

I'll raptur'd trace the circling bounds,

Of thy RICH PARADISE extended,

And listen to the varying sounds

Of winds, and foaming torrents blended.

 

And now, with lofty tones inviting,

Thy NYMPH, her dulcimer swift smiting,

Shall wake me in ecstatic measures!

Far, far remov'd from mortal pleasures!

In cadence rich, in cadence strong,

Proving the wondrous witcheries of song!

I hear her voice! thy sunny dome,

Thy caves of ice, loud repeat,

Vibrations, madd'ning sweet,

Calling the visionary wand'rer home.

She sings of THEE, O favour'd child

Of Minstrelsy, SUBLIMELY WILD!

Of thee, whose soul can feel the tone

Which gives to airy dreams a magic ALL THY OWN!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

it's over a(see just (cummings)

it's over a(see just over this)wall the apples are(yes they're gravensteins)all as red as to lose and as round as to find. Each why of a leaf says (floating each how) you're which as to die (each green of a new) you're who as to grow but you're he as to do what must(whispers)be must be(the wise fool) if living's to give so breathing's to steal-- five wishes are five and one hand is a mind then over our thief goes (you go and i) has pulled(for he's we) such fruit from what bough that someone called they made him pay with his now. But over a(see just over this)wall the red and the round (they're gravensteins)fall with a kind of a blind big sound on the ground
Read more

The Dead Baby, William Carlos Williams

  Sweep the house under the feet of the curious holiday seekers — sweep under the table and the bed the baby is dead — The mother's eyes where she sits by the window, unconsoled — have purple bags under them the father — tall, wellspoken, pitiful is the abler of these two — Sweep the house clean here is one who has gone up (though problematically) to heaven, blindly by force of the facts — a clean sweep is one way of expressing it — Hurry up! any minute they will be bringing it from the hospital — a white model of our lives a curiosity — surrounded by fresh flowers
Read more

Joseph Andrews, Henry Fielding

        The HISTORY Of the ADVENTURES Of JOSEPH ANDREWS And of his F riend Mr. ABRAHAM ADAMS. Written in Imitation of The Manner of Cervantes, Author of Don Quixote . 1742     AUTHOR’S PREFACE. As it is possible the mere English reader [1] may have a different idea of romance from the author of these little [2] volumes, and may consequently expect a kind of entertainment not to be found, nor which was even intended, in the following pages, it may not be improper to premise a few words concerning this kind of writing, which I do not remember to have seen hitherto attempted in our language. The EPIC, as well as the DRAMA, is divided into tragedy and comedy. HOMER, who was the father of this species of poetry, gave us a pattern of both these, though that of the latter kind is entirely lost; which Aristotle tells us, bore the same relation to comedy which his Iliad bears to tragedy. And perhaps, that we have no more i...
Read more