Seen mid the sapphire heaven's deep repose;
Into her dream he melted, as the rose
Blendeth its odour with the violet,-

Solution sweet: meantime the frost-wind blows Like Love's alarum pattering the sharp sleet Against the window-panes; St. Agnes' moon hath set.

'Tis dark: quick pattereth the flaw-blown sleet: 'This is no dream, my bride, my Madeline!' 'Tis dark: the icèd gusts still rave and beat: 'No dream, alas! alas! and woe is mine! Porphyro will leave me here to fade and pine.— Cruel! what traitor could thee hither bring? I curse not, for my heart is lost in thine, Though thou forsakest a deceived thing:A dove forlorn and lost with sick unprunèd wing!'

'My Madeline! sweet dreamer! lovely bride!
Say, may I be for aye thy vassal blest?

Thy beauty's shield, heart-shap'd and vermeil dyed?
Ah, silver shrine, here will I take my rest
After so many hours of toil and quest,

A famish'd pilgrim,-saved by miracle.

Though I have found, I will not rob thy nest Saving of thy sweet self; if thou think'st well To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude infidel.

'Hark! 'tis an elfin-storm from faery land,
Of haggard seeming, but a boon indeed:
Arise-arise! the morning is at hand;-
The bloated wassaillers will never heed :—
Let us away, my love, with happy speed;
There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see,-
Drown'd all in Rhenish and the sleepy mead:
Awake! arise! my love, and fearless be,

For o'er the southern moors I have a home for thee.'

She hurried at his words, beset with fears,
For there were sleeping dragons all around,
At glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears-

Down the wide stairs a darkling way they found.-
In all the house was heard no human sound.
A chain-droop'd lamp was flickering by each door;
The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hound,
Flutter'd in the besieging wind's uproar

And the long carpets rose along the gusty floor.

They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall;
Like phantoms, to the iron porch, they glide;
Where lay the Porter, in uneasy sprawl,
With a huge empty flagon by his side:

The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide,
But his sagacious eye an inmate owns:

By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide:

The chains lie silent on the footworn stones;The key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans.

And they are gone: aye, ages long ago These lovers fled away into the storm. That night the Baron dreamt of many a woe, And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm, Were long be-nightmar'd. Angela the old Died palsy-twitch'd, with meagre face deform; The Beadsman, after thousand aves told, For aye unsought for slept among his ashes cold.

535

LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI

'O WHAT can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?

The sedge has wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing.

'O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms!
So haggard and so woe-begone?

The squirrel's granary is full,

And the harvest's done.

'I see a lily on thy brow

With anguish moist and fever-dew, And on thy cheeks a fading rose Fast withereth too.

'I met a lady in the meads,

Full beautiful-a faery's child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.

'I made a garland for her head,

And bracelets too, and fragrant zone; She look'd at me as she did love,

And made sweet moan.

'I set her on my pacing steed
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
A fairy's song.

'She found me roots of relish sweet, And honey wild and manna-dew, And sure in language strange she said "I love thee true."

'She took me to her elfin grot,

And there she wept and sigh'd full sore, And there I shut her wild wild eyes

With kisses four.

'And there she lulléd me asleep,

And there I dream'd-Ah! woe betide! The latest dream I ever dream'd

On the cold hill's side.

'I saw pale kings and princes too,

Pale warriors, death-pale were they all, They cried "La belle Dame sans Merci Hath thee in thrall!"

536

'I saw their starved lips in the gloam
With horrid warning gapéd wide,
And I awoke and found me here

On the cold hill's side.

'And this is why I sojourn here
Alone and palely loitering,

Though the sedge is wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing.'

ON THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET

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:
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.

537

ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPMAN'S HOMER
MUCH have I travell'd in the realms of gold
And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;
Round many western islands have I been
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.

Oft of one wide expanse had I been told
That deep-brow'd Homer ruled as his demesne:
Yet did I never breathe its pure serene

Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:

-Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken;
Or like stout Cortez-when with eagle eyes

He stared at the Pacific-and all his men
Look'd at each other with a wild surmise-
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.

538

539

TO SLEEP

O SOFT embalmer of the still midnight!
Shutting with careful fingers and benign
Our gloom-pleased eyes, embower'd from the light,
Enshaded in forgetfulness divine;

O soothest Sleep! if so it please thee, close,
In midst of this thine hymn, my willing eyes,
Or wait the amen, ere thy poppy throws

Around my bed its lulling charities;

Then save me, or the passèd day will shine
Upon my pillow, breeding many woes;

Save me from curious conscience, that still lords

Its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole; Turn the key deftly in the oilèd wards,

And seal the hushèd casket of my soul.

THE HUMAN SEASONS

FOUR Seasons fill the measure of the year;
There are four seasons in the mind of Man:
He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear
Takes in all beauty with an easy span:

He has his Summer, when luxuriously
Spring's honey'd cud of youthful thought he loves
To ruminate, and by such dreaming high

Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves