WILLIAM BLAKE (1757-1827)

From Milton (1804)

1 And did those feet in ancient time 
2 Walk upon England's mountains green?
3 And was the holy Lamb of God
4 On England's pleasant pastures seen? 
5 And did the Countenance Divine
6 Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
7 And was Jerusalem builded here
8 Among these dark Satanic mills? 
9 Bring me my bow of burning gold:
10 Bring me my arrows of desire:
11 Bring me my spear: O clouds unfold!
12 Bring me my chariot of fire. 
13 I will not cease from mental fight,
14 Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
15 Till we have built Jerusalem
16 In England's green and pleasant land.

THE LITTLE BLACK BOY

(Original Text: William Blake, Songs of Innocence (1789). 

1 My mother bore me in the southern wild,
2 And I am black, but O! my soul is white;
3 White as an angel is the English child,
4 But I am black, as if bereav'd of light.

5 My mother taught me underneath a tree,
6 And sitting down before the heat of day,
7 She took me on her lap and kissed me,
8 And pointing to the east, began to say:

9 "Look on the rising sun: there God does live, 
10 And gives his light, and gives his heat away;
11 And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive
12 Comfort in morning, joy in the noonday.

13 And we are put on earth a little space,
14 That we may learn to bear the beams of love;
15 And these black bodies and this sunburnt face
16 Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.

17 For when our souls have learn'd the heat to bear, 
18 The cloud will vanish; we shall hear his voice,
19 Saying: 'Come out from the grove, my love and care,
20 And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice.' "

21 Thus did my mother say, and kissed me;
22 And thus I say to little English boy,
23 When I from black and he from white cloud free,
24 And round the tent of God like lambs we joy,

25 I'll shade him from the heat, till he can bear
26 To lean in joy upon our father's knee;
27 And then I'll stand and stroke his silver hair,
28 And be like him, and he will then love me.

THE LAMB

Original Text: William Blake, Songs of Innocence (1789).

1 Little Lamb, who made thee? 
2 Dost thou know who made thee? 
3 Gave thee life, and bid thee feed
4 By the stream and o'er the mead;
5 Gave thee clothing of delight,
6 Softest clothing, woolly, bright;
7 Gave thee such a tender voice, 
8 Making all the vales rejoice?
9 Little Lamb, who made thee?
10 Dost thou know who made thee?

11 Little Lamb, I'll tell thee,
12 Little Lamb, I'll tell thee:
13 He is called by thy name,
14 For he calls himself a Lamb.
15 He is meek, and he is mild;
16 He became a little child.
17 I a child, and thou a lamb.
18 We are called by his name.
19 Little Lamb, God bless thee!
20 Little Lamb, God bless thee! 

THE TYGER

William Blake, Songs of Experience (1794).

1 Tyger! Tyger! burning bright 
2 In the forests of the night,
3 What immortal hand or eye
4 Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

5 In what distant deeps or skies
6 Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
7 On what wings dare he aspire?
8 What the hand dare seize the fire?

9 And what shoulder, and what art, 
10 Could twist the sinews of thy heart,
11 And when thy heart began to beat,
12 What dread hand? and what dread feet?

13 What the hammer? what the chain?
14 In what furnace was thy brain?
15 What the anvil? what dread grasp
16 Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

17 When the stars threw down their spears,
18 And water'd heaven with their tears,
19 Did he smile his work to see?
20 Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

21 Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
22 In the forests of the night,
23 What immortal hand or eye,
24 Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

LONDON

 
Original Text: William Blake, Songs of Experience (1794).

1 I wander thro' each charter'd street, 
2 Near where the charter'd Thames does flow,
3 And mark in every face I meet
4 Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

5 In every cry of every Man, 
6 In every Infant's cry of fear,
7 In every voice, in every ban,
8 The mind-forg'd manacles I hear.

9 How the Chimney-sweeper's cry
10 Every black'ning Church appalls;
11 And the hapless Soldier's sigh
12 Runs in blood down Palace walls.

13 But most thro' midnight streets I hear
14 How the youthful Harlot's curse
15 Blasts the new born Infant's tear,
16 And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse. 

THE SICK ROSE

 
William Blake, Songs of Experience (1794). 

1 O Rose, thou art sick! 
2 The invisible worm
3 That flies in the night,
4 In the howling storm,

5 Has found out thy bed
6 Of crimson joy:
7 And his dark secret love
8 Does thy life destroy.

George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824)

Lake Leman 
(from Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Canto iii, stanzas 68-75) (1816) 

LXVIII 
    Lake Leman woos me with its crystal face,
    The mirror where the stars and mountains view
    The stillness of their aspect in each trace
    Its clear depth yields of their far height and hue:
    There is too much of man here, to look through
    With a fit mind the might which I behold;
    But soon in me shall loneliness renew
    Thoughts hid, but not less cherish'd than of old,
    Ere mingling with the herd had penn'd me in their fold.

LXIX 
    To fly from, need not be to hate, mankind: 
    All are not fit with them to stir and toil,
    Nor is it discontent to keep the mind
    Deep in its fountain, lest it over boil
    In the hot throng, where we become the spoil
    Of our infection, till too late and long
    We may deplore and struggle with the coil,
    In wretched interchange of wrong for wrong
    Midst a contentious world, striving where none are strong.

LXX 
    There, in a moment we may plunge our years
    In fatal penitence, and in the blight
    Of our own soul turn all our blood to tears,
    And colour things to come with hues of Night;
    The race of life becomes a hopeless flight
    To those that walk in darkness: on the sea
    The boldest steer but where their ports invite;
    But there are wanderers o'er Eternity
    Whose bark drives on and on, and anchor'd ne'er shall be.

LXXI 
    Is it not better, then, to be alone,
    And love Earth only for its earthly sake?
    By the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone,
    Or the pure bosom of its nursing lake,
    Which feeds it as a mother who doth make
    A fair but froward infant her own care, 
    Kissing its cries away as these awake--
    Is it not better thus our lives to wear,
    Than join the crushing crowd, doom'd to inflict or bear?

LXXII 
    I live not in myself, but I become
    Portion of that around me; and to me
    High mountains are a feeling, but the hum
    Of human cities torture: I can see
    Nothing to loathe in nature, save to be
    A link reluctant in a fleshly chain,
    Class'd among creatures, when the soul can flee,
    And with the sky--the peak--the heaving plain
    Of ocean, or the stars, mingle--and not in vain.

LXXIII 
    And thus I am absorb'd, and this is life:
    I look upon the peopled desert past,
    As on a place of agony and strife,
    Where, for some sin, to sorrow I was cast,
    To act and suffer, but remount at last
    With a fresh pinion; which I feel to spring,
    Though young, yet waxing vigorous as the blast
    Which it would cope with, on delighted wing,
    Spurning the clay-cold bonds which round our being cling.

LXXIV 
    And when, at length, the mind shall be all free
    From what it hates in this degraded form,
    Reft of its carnal life, save what shall be
    Existent happier in the fly and worm,
    When elements to elements conform,
    And dust is as it should be, shall I not
    Feel all I see, less dazzling, but more warm?
    The bodiless thought? the Spirit of each spot?
    Of which, even now, I share at times the immortal lot?

LXXV 
    Are not the mountains, waves and skies a part
    Of me and of my soul, as I of them?
    Is not the love of these deep in my heart
    With a pure passion? should I not contemn
    All objects, if compar'd with these? and stem
    A tide of suffering, rather than forego
    Such feelings for the hard and worldly phlegm
    Of those whose eyes are only turn'd below,
    Gazing upon the ground, with thoughts which dare not glow?

She Walks in Beauty, Like the Night

SHE walks in beauty, like the night 
Of cloudless climes and starry skies, 
And all that's best of dark and bright 
Meets in her aspect and her eyes; 
Thus mellow'd to that tender light 5
Which Heaven to gaudy day denies. 

One shade the more, one ray the less, 
Had half impair'd the nameless grace 
Which waves in every raven tress 
Or softly lightens o'er her face, 10
Where thoughts serenely sweet express 
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place. 

And on that cheek and o'er that brow 
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, 
The smiles that win, the tints that glow, 15
But tell of days in goodness spent,- 
A mind at peace with all below, 
A heart whose love is innocent. 

Gainsborough, Thomas
Mrs. Peter William Baker 1781

DARKNESS 
First Publication Date: 1816

    I had a dream, which was not all a dream. 
    The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars
    Did wander darkling in the eternal space,
    Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth
    Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;
    Morn came and went--and came, and brought no day,
    And men forgot their passions in the dread
    Of this their desolation; and all hearts
    Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light:
    And they did live by watchfires--and the thrones,
    The palaces of crowned kings--the huts,
    The habitations of all things which dwell,
    Were burnt for beacons; cities were consum'd,
    And men were gather'd round their blazing homes
    To look once more into each other's face;
    Happy were those who dwelt within the eye
    Of the volcanos, and their mountain-torch:
    A fearful hope was all the world contain'd;
    Forests were set on fire--but hour by hour
    They fell and faded--and the crackling trunks
    Extinguish'd with a crash--and all was black.
    The brows of men by the despairing light
    Wore an unearthly aspect, as by fits
     The flashes fell upon them; some lay down
    And hid their eyes and wept; and some did rest
    Their chins upon their clenched hands, and smil'd;
    And others hurried to and fro, and fed
    Their funeral piles with fuel, and look'd up
    With mad disquietude on the dull sky,
    The pall of a past world; and then again
    With curses cast them down upon the dust,
    And gnash'd their teeth and howl'd: the wild birds shriek'd
    And, terrified, did flutter on the ground,
    And flap their useless wings; the wildest brutes
    Came tame and tremulous; and vipers crawl'd
    And twin'd themselves among the multitude,
    Hissing, but stingless--they were slain for food.
    And War, which for a moment was no more,
    Did glut himself again: a meal was bought
    With blood, and each sate sullenly apart
    Gorging himself in gloom: no love was left;
    All earth was but one thought--and that was death
    Immediate and inglorious; and the pang
    Of famine fed upon all entrails--men
    Died, and their bones were tombless as their flesh; 
    The meagre by the meagre were devour'd,
    Even dogs assail'd their masters, all save one,
    And he was faithful to a corse, and kept
    The birds and beasts and famish'd men at bay,
    Till hunger clung them, or the dropping dead
    Lur'd their lank jaws; himself sought out no food,
    But with a piteous and perpetual moan,
    And a quick desolate cry, licking the hand
    Which answer'd not with a caress--he died.
    The crowd was famish'd by degrees; but two
    Of an enormous city did survive,
    And they were enemies: they met beside
    The dying embers of an altar-place
    Where had been heap'd a mass of holy things
    For an unholy usage; they rak'd up,
    And shivering scrap'd with their cold skeleton hands
    The feeble ashes, and their feeble breath
    Blew for a little life, and made a flame
    Which was a mockery; then they lifted up
    Their eyes as it grew lighter, and beheld
    Each other's aspects--saw, and shriek'd, and died-
    Even of their mutual hideousness they died,
    Unknowing who he was upon whose brow
    Famine had written Fiend. The world was void,
    The populous and the powerful was a lump,
    Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, lifeless--
    A lump of death--a chaos of hard clay.
    The rivers, lakes and ocean all stood still,
    And nothing stirr'd within their silent depths;
    Ships sailorless lay rotting on the sea,
    And their masts fell down piecemeal: as they dropp'd
    They slept on the abyss without a surge--
    The waves were dead; the tides were in their grave,
    The moon, their mistress, had expir'd before;
    The winds were wither'd in the stagnant air,
    And the clouds perish'd; Darkness had no need
    Of aid from them--She was the Universe.

Robert Burns (1759-1796)

TO A MOUSE, ON TURNING UP HER NEST WITH THE PLOUGH, NOVEMBER, 1785 

1 Wee, sleeket, cowrin, tim'rous beastie, 
2 Oh, what a panic's in thy breastie!
3 Thou need na start awa sae hasty
4   Wi' bickerin brattle!
5 I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee
6   Wi' murd'ring pattle!

7 I'm truly sorry man's dominion
8 Has broken Nature's social union,
9 An' justifies that ill opinion
10   Which makes thee startle
11 At me, thy poor earth-born companion,
12   An' fellow-mortal!

13 I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve:
14 What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!
15 A daimen icker in a thrave
16   'S a sma' request;
17 I'll get a blessin wi' the lave,
18   An' never miss 't!

19 Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin!
20 Its silly wa's the win's are strewin!
21 An' naething, now, to big a new ane,
22   O' foggage green!
23 An' bleak December's winds ensuin
24   Baith snell an' keen!

25 Thou saw the fields laid bare an' wast,
26 An' weary winter comin fast,
27 An' cozie here beneath the blast
28   Thou thought to dwell,
29 Till crash! the cruel coulter past
30   Out thro' thy cell.

31 That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble
32 Has cost thee monie a weary nibble!
33 Now thou's turn'd out for a' thy trouble,
34   But house or hald,
35 To thole the winter's sleety dribble
36   An' cranreuch cauld!

37 But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane
38 In proving foresight may be vain:
39 The best laid schemes o' mice an' men
40   Gang aft agley,
41 An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain
42   For promis'd joy.

43 Still thou art blest, compar'd wi' me!
44 The present only toucheth thee:
45 But, och! I backward cast my e'e
46   On prospects drear!
47 An' forward, tho' I canna see,
48   I guess an' fear! 

1 Ae fond kiss, and then we sever; 
2 Ae fareweel, and then forever! 
3 Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee, 
4 Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee. 
5 Who shall say that Fortune grieves him, 
6 While the star of hope she leaves him? 
7 Me, nae cheerfu' twinkle lights me; 
8 Dark despair around benights me. 
9 I'll ne'er blame my partial fancy, 
10 Naething could resist my Nancy; 
11 But to see her was to love her; 
12 Love but her, and love forever. 
13 Had we never lov'd sae kindly, 
14 Had we never lov'd sae blindly, 
15 Never met--or never parted-- 
16 We had ne'er been broken-hearted. 
17 Fare thee weel, thou first and fairest! 
18 Fare thee weel, thou best and dearest! 
19 Thine be ilka joy and treasure, 
20 Peace. enjoyment, love, and pleasure! 
21 Ae fond kiss, and then we sever; 
22 Ae fareweel, alas, forever! 
23 Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee, 
24 Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee!

The Village Betrothal (1764) Jean-Baptiste Greuze

William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

Residence in France
(from The Prelude, Book 11, lines 105-145)

O pleasant exercise of hope and joy!
For mighty were the auxiliars which then stood
Upon our side, us who were strong in love!
Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive,
But to be young was very Heaven! O times,
In which the meagre, stale, forbidding ways 110
Of custom, law, and statute, took at once
The attraction of a country in romance!
When Reason seemed the most to assert her rights
When most intent on making of herself
A prime enchantress--to assist the work,
Which then was going forward in her name!
Not favoured spots alone, but the whole Earth,
The beauty wore of promise--that which sets
(As at some moments might not be unfelt
Among the bowers of Paradise itself) 
The budding rose above the rose full blown.
What temper at the prospect did not wake
To happiness unthought of? The inert
Were roused, and lively natures rapt away!
They who had fed their childhood upon dreams,
The play-fellows of fancy, who had made
All powers of swiftness, subtilty, and strength
Their ministers,--who in lordly wise had stirred
Among the grandest objects of the sense,
And dealt with whatsoever they found there 
As if they had within some lurking right
To wield it;--they, too, who of gentle mood
Had watched all gentle motions, and to these
Had fitted their own thoughts, schemers more mild,
And in the region of their peaceful selves;--
Now was it that 'both' found, the meek and lofty
Did both find, helpers to their hearts' desire,
And stuff at hand, plastic as they could wish,--
Were called upon to exercise their skill,
Not in Utopia,--subterranean fields,-- 140
Or some secreted island, Heaven knows where!
But in the very world, which is the world
Of all of us,--the place where, in the end,
We find our happiness, or not at all!

Liberty Leading the People (1830), Delacroix

WE ARE SEVEN 
First published in Lyrical Ballads (1798)

--------A SIMPLE Child,
That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death?

I met a little cottage Girl:
She was eight years old, she said;
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered round her head.

She had a rustic, woodland air,
And she was wildly clad: 
Her eyes were fair, and very fair;
--Her beauty made me glad.

"Sisters and brothers, little Maid,
How many may you be?"
"How many? Seven in all," she said
And wondering looked at me.

"And where are they? I pray you tell."
She answered, "Seven are we;
And two of us at Conway dwell,
And two are gone to sea. 20

"Two of us in the church-yard lie,
My sister and my brother;
And, in the church-yard cottage, I
Dwell near them with my mother."

"You say that two at Conway dwell,
And two are gone to sea,
Yet ye are seven!--I pray you tell,
Sweet Maid, how this may be."

Then did the little Maid reply,
"Seven boys and girls are we; 30
Two of us in the church-yard lie,
Beneath the church-yard tree."

"You run about, my little Maid,
Your limbs they are alive;
If two are in the church-yard laid,
Then ye are only five."

"Their graves are green, they may be seen,"
The little Maid replied,
"Twelve steps or more from my mother's door,
And they are side by side. 40

"My stockings there I often knit,
My kerchief there I hem;
And there upon the ground I sit,
And sing a song to them.

"And often after sunset, Sir,
When it is light and fair,
I take my little porringer,
And eat my supper there.

"The first that died was sister Jane;
In bed she moaning lay, 50
Till God released her of her pain;
And then she went away.

"So in the church-yard she was laid;
And, when the grass was dry,
Together round her grave we played,
My brother John and I.

"And when the ground was white with snow,
And I could run and slide,
My brother John was forced to go,
And he lies by her side." 60

"How many are you, then," said I,
"If they two are in heaven?"
Quick was the little Maid's reply,
"O Master! we are seven."

"But they are dead; those two are dead!
Their spirits are in heaven!"
'Twas throwing words away; for still
The little Maid would have her will,
And said, "Nay, we are seven!"
1798.

SIMON LEE 
THE OLD HUNTSMAN; 
WITH AN INCIDENT IN WHICH HE WAS CONCERNED 
First Published in Lyrical Ballads (1798)

IN the sweet shire of Cardigan,
Not far from pleasant Ivor-hall,
An old Man dwells, a little man,--
'Tis said he once was tall.
Full five-and-thirty years he lived
A running huntsman merry;
And still the centre of his cheek
Is red as a ripe cherry.

No man like him the horn could sound,
And hill and valley rang with glee 10
When Echo bandied, round and round,
The halloo of Simon Lee.
In those proud days, he little cared
For husbandry or tillage;
To blither tasks did Simon rouse
The sleepers of the village.

He all the country could outrun,
Could leave both man and horse behind;
And often, ere the chase was done,
He reeled, and was stone-blind. 20
And still there's something in the world
At which his heart rejoices;
For when the chiming hounds are out,
He dearly loves their voices!

But, oh the heavy change!--bereft
Of health, strength, friends, and kindred, see!
Old Simon to the world is left
In liveried poverty.
His Master's dead,--and no one now
Dwells in the Hall of Ivor; 30
Men, dogs, and horses, all are dead;
He is the sole survivor.

And he is lean and he is sick;
His body, dwindled and awry,
Rests upon ankles swoln and thick;
His legs are thin and dry.
One prop he has, and only one,
His wife, an aged woman,
Lives with him, near the waterfall,
Upon the village Common. 40

Beside their moss-grown hut of clay,
Not twenty paces from the door,
A scrap of land they have, but they
Are poorest of the poor.
This scrap of land he from the heath
Enclosed when he was stronger;
But what to them avails the land
Which he can till no longer?

Oft, working by her Husband's side,
Ruth does what Simon cannot do; 50
For she, with scanty cause for pride,
Is stouter of the two.
And, though you with your utmost skill
From labour could not wean them,
'Tis little, very little--all
That they can do between them.

Few months of life has he in store
As he to you will tell,
For still, the more he works, the more
Do his weak ankles swell. 60
My gentle Reader, I perceive
How patiently you've waited,
And now I fear that you expect
Some tale will be related.

O Reader! had you in your mind
Such stores as silent thought can bring,
O gentle Reader! you would find
A tale in every thing.
What more I have to say is short,
And you must kindly take it: 70
It is no tale; but, should you think,
Perhaps a tale you'll make it.

One summer-day I chanced to see
This old Man doing all he could
To unearth the root of an old tree,
A stump of rotten wood.
The mattock tottered in his hand;
So vain was his endeavour,
That at the root of the old tree
He might have worked for ever. 80

"You're overtasked, good Simon Lee,
Give me your tool," to him I said;
And at the word right gladly he
Received my proffered aid.
I struck, and with a single blow
The tangled root I severed,
At which the poor old Man so long
And vainly had endeavoured.

The tears into his eyes were brought,
And thanks and praises seemed to run 90
So fast out of his heart, I thought
They never would have done.
--I've heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds
With coldness still returning;
Alas! the gratitude of men
Hath oftener left me mourning.

GOODY BLAKE, AND HARRY GILL, 
A TRUE STORY. 

1 Oh! what's the matter? what's the matter?
2 What is't that ails young Harry Gill?
3 That evermore his teeth they chatter,
4 Chatter, chatter, chatter still.
5 Of waistcoats Harry has no lack,
6 Good duffle grey, and flannel fine;
7 He has a blanket on his back,
8 And coats enough to smother nine. 

9 In March, December, and in July,
10 'Tis all the same with Harry Gill;
11 The neighbours tell, and tell you truly,
12 His teeth they chatter, chatter still.
13 At night, at morning, and at noon,
14 'Tis all the same with Harry Gill;
15 Beneath the sun, beneath the moon,
16 His teeth they chatter, chatter still. 
17 Young Harry was a lusty drover,
18 And who so stout of limb as he?
19 His cheeks were red as ruddy clover,
20 His voice was like the voice of three.
21 Auld Goody Blake was old and poor,
22 Ill fed she was, and thinly clad;
23 And any man who pass'd her door,
24 Might see how poor a hut she had. 

25 All day she spun in her poor dwelling,
26 And then her three hours' work at night!
27 Alas! 'twas hardly worth the telling,
28 It would not pay for candle-light.
29 --This woman dwelt in Dorsetshire,
30 Her hut was on a cold hill-side,
31 And in that country coals are dear,
32 For they come far by wind and tide. 
33 By the same fire to boil their pottage,
34 Two poor old dames, as I have known,
35 Will often live in one small cottage,
36 But she, poor woman, dwelt alone.
37 'Twas well enough when summer came,
38 The long, warm, lightsome summer-day,
39 Then at her door the canty dame
40 Would sit, as any linnet gay. 

41 But when the ice our streams did fetter,
42 Oh! then how her old bones would shake!
43 You would have said, if you had met her,
44 'Twas a hard time for Goody Blake.
45 Her evenings then were dull and dead;
46 Sad case it was, as you may think,
47 For very cold to go to bed,
48 And then for cold not sleep a wink. 
49 Oh joy for her! when e'er in winter
50 The winds at night had made a rout,
51 And scatter'd many a lusty splinter,
52 And many a rotten bough about.
53 Yet never bad she, well or sick,
54 As every man who knew her says,
55 A pile before-hand, wood or stick,
56 Enough to warm her for three days. 

57 Now, when the frost was past enduring,
58 And made her poor old bones to ache,
59 Could any thing be more alluring,
60 Than an old hedge to Goody Blake?
61 And now and then, it must be said,
62 When her old bones were cold and chill,
63 She left her fire, or left her bed,
64 To seek the hedge of Harry Gill. 
65 Now Harry he had long suspected
66 This trespass of old Goody Blake,
67 And vow'd that she should be detected,
68 And he on her would vengeance take.
69 And oft from his warm fire he'd go,
70 And to the fields his road would take,
71 And there, at night, in frost and snow,
72 He watch'd to seize old Goody Blake. 

73 And once, behind a rick of barley,
74 Thus looking out did Harry stand;
75 The moon was full and shining clearly,
76 And crisp with frost the stubble-land.
77 --He hears a noise--he's all awake--
78 Again?--on tip-toe down the hill
79 He softly creeps--'Tis Goody Blake,
80 She's at the hedge of Harry Gill. 
81 Right glad was he when he beheld her:
82 Stick after stick did Goody pull, 
83 He stood behind a bush of elder,
84 Till she had filled her apron full.
85 When with her load she turned about,
86 The bye-road back again to take,
87 He started forward with a shout,
88 And sprang upon poor Goody Blake. 

89 And fiercely by the arm he took her,
90 And by the arm he held her fast,
91 And fiercely by the arm he shook her,
92 And cried, "I've caught you then at last!"
93 Then Goody, who had nothing said,
94 Her bundle from her lap let fall;
95 And kneeling on the sticks, she pray'd
96 To God that is the judge of all. 
97 She pray'd, her wither'd hand uprearing,
98 While Harry held her by the arm--
99 "God! who art never out of hearing,
100 O may he never more be warm!"
101 The cold, cold moon above her head,
102 Thus on her knees did Goody pray,
103 Young Harry heard what she had said,
104 And icy-cold he turned away. 

105 He went complaining all the morrow
106 That he was cold and very chill:
107 His face was gloom, his heart was sorrow,
108 Alas! that day for Harry Gill!
109 That day he wore a riding-coat,
110 But not a whit the warmer he:
111 Another was on Thursday brought,
112 And ere the Sabbath he had three. 
113 'Twas all in vain, a useless matter,
114 And blankets were about him pinn'd;
115 Yet still his jaws and teeth they clatter,
116 Like a loose casement in the wind.
117 And Harry's flesh it fell away;
118 And all who see him say 'tis plain,
119 That, live as long as live he may,
120 He never will be warm again. 

121 No word to any man he utters,
122 A-bed or up, to young or old;
123 But ever to himself he mutters,
124 "Poor Harry Gill is very cold."
125 A-bed or up, by night or day;
126 His teeth they chatter, chatter still.
127 Now think, ye farmers all, I pray,
128 Of Goody Blake and Harry Gill. 

THE MAD MOTHER

1 Her eyes are wild, her head is bare,
2 The sun has burnt her coal-black hair,
3 Her eye-brows have a rusty stain,
4 And she came far from over the main.
5 She has a baby on her arm,
6 Or else she were alone;
7 And underneath the hay-stack warm,
8 And on the green-wood stone,
9 She talked and sung the woods among;
10 And it was in the English tongue. 

11 "Sweet babe! they say that I am mad,
12 But nay, my heart is far too glad;
13 And I am happy when I sing
14 Full many a sad and doleful thing:
15 Then, lovely baby, do not fear!
16 I pray thee have no fear of me,
17 But, safe as in a cradle, here
18 My lovely baby! thou shalt be,
19 To thee I know too much I owe;
20 I cannot work thee any woe. 
21 A fire was once within my brain;
22 And in my head a dull, dull pain;
23 And fiendish faces one, two, three,
24 Hung at my breasts, and pulled at me.
25 But then there came a sight of joy;
26 It came at once to do me good;
27 I waked, and saw my little boy,
28 My little boy of flesh and blood;
29 Oh joy for me that sight to see!
30 For he was here, and only he. 

31 Suck, little babe, oh suck again!
32 It cools my blood; it cools my brain;
33 Thy lips I feel them, baby! they
34 Draw from my heart the pain away.
35 Oh! press me with thy little hand;
36 It loosens something at my chest;
37 About that tight and deadly band
38 I feel thy little fingers press'd.
39 The breeze I see is in the tree;
40 It comes to cool my babe and me. 
41 Oh! love me, love me, little boy!
42 Thou art thy mother's only joy;
43 And do not dread the waves below,
44 When o'er the sea-rock's edge we go;
45 The high crag cannot work me harm,
46 Nor leaping torrents when they howl;
47 The babe I carry on my arm,
48 He saves for me my precious soul;
49 Then happy lie, for blest am I;
50 Without me my sweet babe would die. 

51 Then do not fear, my boy! for thee
52 Bold as a lion I will be;
53 And I will always be thy guide,
54 Through hollow snows and rivers wide.
55 I'll build an Indian bower; I know
56 The leaves that make the softest bed:
57 And if from me thou wilt not go,
58 But still be true 'till I am dead,
59 My pretty thing! then thou shalt sing,
60 As merry as the birds in spring. 
61 Thy father cares not for my breast,
62 'Tis thine, sweet baby, there to rest:
63 'Tis all thine own! and if its hue
64 Be changed, that was so fair to view,
65 'Tis fair enough for thee, my dove!
66 My beauty, little child, is flown;
67 But thou wilt live with me in love,
68 And what if my poor cheek be brown?
69 'Tis well for me; thou canst not see
70 How pale and wan it else would be. 

71 Dread not their taunts, my little life!
72 I am thy father's wedded wife;
73 And underneath the spreading tree
74 We two will live in honesty.
75 If his sweet boy he could forsake,
76 With me he never would have stay'd:
77 From him no harm my babe can take,
78 But he, poor man! is wretched made,
79 And every day we two will pray 
80 For him that's gone and far away. 
81 I'll teach my boy the sweetest things;
82 I'll teach him how the owlet sings.
83 My little babe! thy lips are still,
84 And thou hast almost suck'd thy fill.
85 --Where art thou gone my own dear child?
86 What wicked looks are those I see?
87 Alas! alas! that look so wild,
88 It never, never came from me:
89 If thou art mad, my pretty lad,
90 Then I must be for ever sad. 

91 Oh! smile on me, my little lamb!
92 For I thy own dear mother am.
93 My love for thee has well been tried:
94 I've sought thy father far and wide.
95 I know the poisons of the shade,
96 I know the earth-nuts fit for food;
97 Then, pretty dear, be not afraid;
98 We'll find thy father in the wood.
99 Now laugh and be gay, to the woods away!
100 And there, my babe; we'll live for aye. 

MEMORIALS OF A TOUR IN SCOTLAND, 1803 
VIII. THE SOLITARY REAPER

BEHOLD her, single in the field,
Yon solitary Highland Lass!
Reaping and singing by herself;
Stop here, or gently pass!
Alone she cuts and binds the grain,
And sings a melancholy strain;
O listen! for the Vale profound
Is overflowing with the sound.

No Nightingale did ever chaunt
More welcome notes to weary bands 
Of travelers in some shady haunt,
Among Arabian sands:
A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard
In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird,
Breaking the silence of the seas
Among the farthest Hebrides.

Will no one tell me what she sings?--
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow
For old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago: 
Or is it some more humble lay,
Familiar matter of to-day?
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain,
That has been, and may be again?

Whate'er the theme, the Maiden sang
As if her song could have no ending;
I saw her singing at her work,
And o'er the sickle bending;--
I listened, motionless and still;
And, as I mounted up the hill
The music in my heart I bore,
Long after it was heard no more.

Resolution and Independence (1807)

I

THERE was a roaring in the wind all night;
The rain came heavily and fell in floods;
But now the sun is rising calm and bright;
The birds are singing in the distant woods;
Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove broods;
The Jay makes answer as the Magpie chatters;
And all the air is filled with pleasant noise of waters.

II

All things that love the sun are out of doors;
The sky rejoices in the morning's birth;
The grass is bright with rain-drops;--on the moors
The hare is running races in her mirth;
And with her feet she from the plashy earth
Raises a mist, that, glittering in the sun,
Runs with her all the way, wherever she doth run.

III

I was a Traveler then upon the moor,
I saw the hare that raced about with joy;
I heard the woods and distant waters roar;
Or heard them not, as happy as a boy:
The pleasant season did my heart employ:
My old remembrances went from me wholly;
And all the ways of men, so vain and melancholy.

IV

But, as it sometimes chanceth, from the might
Of joy in minds that can no further go,
As high as we have mounted in delight
In our dejection do we sink as low;
To me that morning did it happen so;
And fears and fancies thick upon me came;
Dim sadness--and blind thoughts, I knew not, nor could name.

V

I heard the sky-lark warbling in the sky;
And I bethought me of the playful hare:
Even such a happy Child of earth am I;
Even as these blissful creatures do I fare;
Far from the world I walk, and from all care;
But there may come another day to me--
Solitude, pain of heart, distress, and poverty.

VI

My whole life I have lived in pleasant thought,
As if life's business were a summer mood;
As if all needful things would come unsought
To genial faith, still rich in genial good;
But how can He expect that others should
Build for him, sow for him, and at his call
Love him, who for himself will take no heed at all?

VII

I thought of Chatterton, the marvelous Boy,
The sleepless Soul that perished in his pride;
Of Him who walked in glory and in joy
Following his plough, along the mountain-side:
By our own spirits are we deified:
We Poets in our youth begin in gladness;
But thereof come in the end despondency and madness.

VIII

Now, whether it were by peculiar grace,
A leading from above, a something given,
Yet it befell, that, in this lonely place,
When I with these untoward thoughts had striven,
Beside a pool bare to the eye of heaven
I saw a Man before me unawares:
The oldest man he seemed that ever wore grey hairs.

IX

As a huge stone is sometimes seen to lie
Couched on the bald top of an eminence;
Wonder to all who do the same espy,
By what means it could thither come, and whence;
So that it seems a thing endued with sense:
Like a sea-beast crawled forth, that on a shelf
Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun itself;

X

Such seemed this Man, not all alive nor dead,
Nor all asleep--in his extreme old age:
His body was bent double, feet and head
Coming together in life's pilgrimage;
As if some dire constraint of pain, or rage
Of sickness felt by him in times long past,
A more than human weight upon his frame had cast.

XI

Himself he propped, limbs, body, and pale face,
Upon a long grey staff of shaven wood:
And, still as I drew near with gentle pace,
Upon the margin of that moorish flood
Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood,
That heareth not the loud winds when they call
And moveth all together, if it move at all.

XII

At length, himself unsettling, he the pond
Stirred with his staff, and fixedly did look
Upon the muddy water, which he conned,
As if he had been reading in a book:
And now a stranger's privilege I took;
And, drawing to his side, to him did say,
"This morning gives us promise of a glorious day."

XIII

A gentle answer did the old Man make,
In courteous speech which forth he slowly drew:
And him with further words I thus bespake,
"What occupation do you there pursue?
This is a lonesome place for one like you."
Ere he replied, a flash of mild surprise
Broke from the sable orbs of his yet-vivid eyes,

XIV

His words came feebly, from a feeble chest,
But each in solemn order followed each,
With something of a lofty utterance drest--
Choice word and measured phrase, above the reach
Of ordinary men; a stately speech;
Such as grave Livers do in Scotland use,
Religious men, who give to God and man their dues.

XV

He told, that to these waters he had come
To gather leeches, being old and poor:
Employment hazardous and wearisome!
And he had many hardships to endure:
From pond to pond he roamed, from moor to moor;
Housing, with God's good help, by choice or chance,
And in this way he gained an honest maintenance.

XVI

The old Man still stood talking by my side;
But now his voice to me was like a stream
Scarce heard; nor word from word could I divide;
And the whole body of the Man did seem
Like one whom I had met with in a dream;
Or like a man from some far region sent,
To give me human strength, by apt admonishment.

XVII

My former thoughts returned: the fear that kills;
And hope that is unwilling to be fed;
Cold, pain, and labour, and all fleshly ills;
And mighty Poets in their misery dead.
--Perplexed, and longing to be comforted,
My question eagerly did I renew,
"How is it that you live, and what is it you do?"

XVIII

He with a smile did then his words repeat;
And said, that, gathering leeches, far and wide
He traveled; stirring thus about his feet
The waters of the pools where they abide.
"Once I could meet with them on every side;
But they have dwindled long by slow decay;
Yet still I persevere, and find them where I may."

XIX

While he was talking thus, the lonely place,
The old Man's shape, and speech--all troubled me:
In my mind's eye I seemed to see him pace
About the weary moors continually,
Wandering about alone and silently.
While I these thoughts within myself pursued,
He, having made a pause, the same discourse renewed.

XX

And soon with this he other matter blended,
Cheerfully uttered, with demeanour kind,
But stately in the main; and when he ended,
I could have laughed myself to scorn to find
In that decrepit Man so firm a mind.
"God," said I, "be my help and stay secure;
I'll think of the Leech-gatherer on the lonely moor!"
 

1807.

THE IDIOT BOY 

'TIS eight o'clock,--a clear March night,
The moon is up,--the sky is blue,
The owlet, in the moonlight air,
Shouts from nobody knows where;
He lengthens out his lonely shout,
Halloo! halloo! a long halloo!

--Why bustle thus about your door,
What means this bustle, Betty Foy?
Why are you in this mighty fret?
And why on horseback have you set                    10
Him whom you love, your Idiot Boy?

Scarcely a soul is out of bed;
Good Betty, put him down again;
His lips with joy they burr at you;
But, Betty! what has he to do
With stirrup, saddle, or with rein?

But Betty's bent on her intent;
For her good neighbour, Susan Gale,
Old Susan, she who dwells alone,
Is sick, and makes a piteous moan                      20
As if her very life would fail.

There's not a house within a mile,
No hand to help them in distress;
Old Susan lies a-bed in pain,
And sorely puzzled are the twain,
For what she ails they cannot guess.

And Betty's husband's at the wood,
Where by the week he doth abide,
A woodman in the distant vale;
There's none to help poor Susan Gale;               30
What must be done? what will betide?

And Betty from the lane has fetched
Her Pony, that is mild and good;
Whether he be in joy or pain,
Feeding at will along the lane,
Or bringing faggots from the wood.

And he is all in travelling trim,--
And, by the moonlight, Betty Foy
Has on the well-girt saddle set
(The like was never heard of yet)                     40
Him whom she loves, her Idiot Boy.

And he must post without delay
Across the bridge and through the dale,
And by the church, and o'er the down,
To bring a Doctor from the town,
Or she will die, old Susan Gale.

There is no need of boot or spur,
There is no need of whip or wand;
For Johnny has his holly-bough,
And with a 'hurly-burly' now                          50
He shakes the green bough in his hand.

And Betty o'er and o'er has told
The Boy, who is her best delight,
Both what to follow, what to shun,
What do, and what to leave undone,
How turn to left, and how to right.

And Betty's most especial charge,
Was, "Johnny! Johnny! mind that you
Come home again, nor stop at all,--
Come home again, whate'er befall,                60
My Johnny, do, I pray you do."

To this did Johnny answer make,
Both with his head and with his hand,
And proudly shook the bridle too;
And then! his words were not a few,
Which Betty well could understand.

And now that Johnny is just going,
Though Betty's in a mighty flurry,
She gently pats the Pony's side,
On which her Idiot Boy must ride,               70
And seems no longer in a hurry.

But when the Pony moved his legs,
Oh! then for the poor Idiot Boy!
For joy he cannot hold the bridle,
For joy his head and heels are idle,
He's idle all for very joy.

And while the Pony moves his legs,
In Johnny's left hand you may see
The green bough motionless and dead:
The Moon that shines above his head          80
Is not more still and mute than he.

His heart it was so full of glee,
That till full fifty yards were gone,
He quite forgot his holly whip,
And all his skill in horsemanship:
Oh! happy, happy, happy John.

And while the Mother, at the door,
Stands fixed, her face with joy o'erflows,
Proud of herself, and proud of him,
She sees him in his travelling trim,               90
How quietly her Johnny goes.

The silence of her Idiot Boy,
What hopes it sends to Betty's heart!
He's at the guide-post--he turns right;
She watches till he's out of sight,
And Betty will not then depart.

Burr, burr--now Johnny's lips they burr,
As loud as any mill, or near it;
Meek as a lamb the Pony moves,
And Johnny makes the noise he loves,       100
And Betty listens, glad to hear it.

Away she hies to Susan Gale:
Her Messenger's in merry tune;
The owlets hoot, the owlets curr,
And Johnny's lips they burr, burr, burr,
As on he goes beneath the moon.

His steed and he right well agree;
For of this Pony there's a rumour,
That, should he lose his eyes and ears,
And should he live a thousand years,         110
He never will be out of humour.

But then he is a horse that thinks!
And when he thinks, his pace is slack;
Now, though he knows poor Johnny well,
Yet, for his life, he cannot tell
What he has got upon his back.

So through the moonlight lanes they go,
And far into the moonlight dale,
And by the church, and o'er the down,
To bring a Doctor from the town,             120
To comfort poor old Susan Gale.

And Betty, now at Susan's side,
Is in the middle of her story,
What speedy help her Boy will bring,
With many a most diverting thing,
Of Johnny's wit, and Johnny's glory.

And Betty, still at Susan's side,
By this time is not quite so flurried:
Demure with porringer and plate
She sits, as if in Susan's fate                      130
Her life and soul were buried.

But Betty, poor good woman! she,
You plainly in her face may read it,
Could lend out of that moment's store
Five years of happiness or more
To any that might need it.

But yet I guess that now and then
With Betty all was not so well;
And to the road she turns her ears,
And thence full many a sound she hears,     140
Which she to Susan will not tell.

Poor Susan moans, poor Susan groans;
"As sure as there's a moon in heaven,"
Cries Betty, "he'll be back again;
They'll both be here--'tis almost ten--
Both will be here before eleven."

Poor Susan moans, poor Susan groans;
The clock gives warning for eleven;
'Tis on the stroke--"He must be near,"
Quoth Betty, "and will soon be here,          150
As sure as there's a moon in heaven."

The clock is on the stroke of twelve,
And Johnny is not yet in sight:
--The Moon's in heaven, as Betty sees,
But Betty is not quite at ease;
And Susan has a dreadful night.

And Betty, half an hour ago,
On Johnny vile reflections cast:
"A little idle sauntering Thing!"
With other names, an endless string;         160
But now that time is gone and past.

And Betty's drooping at the heart,
That happy time all past and gone,
"How can it be he is so late?
The Doctor, he has made him wait;
Susan! they'll both be here anon."

And Susan's growing worse and worse,
And Betty's in a sad 'quandary';
And then there's nobody to say
If she must go, or she must stay!             170
--She's in a sad 'quandary'.

The clock is on the stroke of one;
But neither Doctor nor his Guide
Appears along the moonlight road;
There's neither horse nor man abroad,
And Betty's still at Susan's side.

And Susan now begins to fear
Of sad mischances not a few,
That Johnny may perhaps be drowned;
Or lost, perhaps, and never found;          180
Which they must both for ever rue.

She prefaced half a hint of this
With, "God forbid it should be true!"
At the first word that Susan said
Cried Betty, rising from the bed,
"Susan, I'd gladly stay with you.

"I must be gone, I must away:
Consider, Johnny's but half-wise;
Susan, we must take care of him,
If he is hurt in life or limb"--                   190
"Oh God forbid!" poor Susan cries.

"What can I do?" says Betty, going,
"What can I do to ease your pain?
Good Susan tell me, and I'll stay;
I fear you're in a dreadful way,
But I shall soon be back again."

"Nay, Betty, go! good Betty, go!
There's nothing that can ease my pain,"
Then off she hies, but with a prayer
That God poor Susan's life would spare,     200
Till she comes back again.

So, through the moonlight lane she goes,
And far into the moonlight dale;
And how she ran, and how she walked,
And all that to herself she talked,
Would surely be a tedious tale.

In high and low, above, below,
In great and small, in round and square,
In tree and tower was Johnny seen,
In bush and brake, in black and green;       210
'Twas Johnny, Johnny, every where.

And while she crossed the bridge, there came
A thought with which her heart is sore--
Johnny perhaps his horse forsook,
To hunt the moon within the brook,
And never will be heard of more.

Now is she high upon the down,
Alone amid a prospect wide;
There's neither Johnny nor his Horse
Among the fern or in the gorse;                 220
There's neither Doctor nor his Guide.

"O saints! what is become of him?
Perhaps he's climbed into an oak,
Where he will stay till he is dead;
Or, sadly he has been misled,
And joined the wandering gipsy-folk.

"Or him that wicked Pony's carried
To the dark cave, the goblin's hall;
Or in the castle he's pursuing
Among the ghosts his own undoing;          230
Or playing with the waterfall."

At poor old Susan then she railed,
While to the town she posts away;
"If Susan had not been so ill,
Alas! I should have had him still,
My Johnny, till my dying day."

Poor Betty, in this sad distemper,
The Doctor's self could hardly spare:
Unworthy things she talked, and wild;
Even he, of cattle the most mild,               240
The Pony had his share.

But now she's fairly in the town,
And to the Doctor's door she hies;
'Tis silence all on every side;
The town so long, the town so wide,
Is silent as the skies.

And now she's at the Doctor's door,
She lifts the knocker, rap, rap, rap;
The Doctor at the casement shows
His glimmering eyes that peep and doze!    250
And one hand rubs his old night-cap.

"O Doctor! Doctor! where's my Johnny?"
"I'm here, what is't you want with me?"
"O Sir! you know I'm Betty Foy,
And I have lost my poor dear Boy,
You know him--him you often see;

"He's not so wise as some folks be:"
"The devil take his wisdom!" said
The Doctor, looking somewhat grim,
"What, Woman! should I know of him?"       260
And, grumbling, he went back to bed!

"O woe is me! O woe is me!
Here will I die, here will I die;
I thought to find my lost one here,
But he is neither far nor near,
Oh! what a wretched Mother I!"

She stops, she stands, she looks about;
Which way to turn she cannot tell.
Poor Betty! it would ease her pain
If she had heart to knock again;                   270
--The clock strikes three--a dismal knell!

Then up along the town she hies,
No wonder if her senses fail;
This piteous news so much it shocked her,
She quite forgot to send the Doctor,
To comfort poor old Susan Gale.

And now she's high upon the down,
And she can see a mile of road:
"O cruel! I'm almost threescore;
Such night as this was ne'er before,              280
There's not a single soul abroad."

She listens, but she cannot hear
The foot of horse, the voice of man;
The streams with softest sound are flowing,
The grass you almost hear it growing,
You hear it now, if e'er you can.

The owlets through the long blue night
Are shouting to each other still:
Fond lovers! yet not quite hob nob,
They lengthen out the tremulous sob,             290
That echoes far from hill to hill.

Poor Betty now has lost all hope,
Her thoughts are bent on deadly sin,
A green-grown pond she just has past,
And from the brink she hurries fast,
Lest she should drown herself therein.

And now she sits her down and weeps;
Such tears she never shed before;
"Oh dear, dear Pony! my sweet joy!
Oh carry back my Idiot Boy!                       300
And we will ne'er o'erload thee more."

A thought is come into her head:
The Pony he is mild and good,
And we have always used him well;
Perhaps he's gone along the dell,
And carried Johnny to the wood.

Then up she springs as if on wings;
She thinks no more of deadly sin;
If Betty fifty ponds should see,
The last of all her thoughts would be           310
To drown herself therein.

O Reader! now that I might tell
What Johnny and his Horse are doing
What they've been doing all this time,
Oh could I put it into rhyme,
A most delightful tale pursuing!

Perhaps, and no unlikely thought!
He with his Pony now doth roam
The cliffs and peaks so high that are,
To lay his hands upon a star,                    320
And in his pocket bring it home.

Perhaps he's turned himself about,
His face unto his horse's tail,
And, still and mute, in wonder lost,
All silent as a horseman-ghost,
He travels slowly down the vale.

And now, perhaps, is hunting sheep,
A fierce and dreadful hunter he;
Yon valley, now so trim and green,
In five months' time, should he be seen,          330
A desert wilderness will be!

Perhaps, with head and heels on fire,
And like the very soul of evil,
He's galloping away, away,
And so will gallop on for aye,
The bane of all that dread the devil!

I to the Muses have been bound
These fourteen years, by strong indentures:
O gentle Muses! let me tell
But half of what to him befell;                        340
He surely met with strange adventures.

O gentle Muses! is this kind?
Why will ye thus my suit repel?
Why of your further aid bereave me?
And can ye thus unfriended leave me
Ye Muses! whom I love so well?

Who's yon, that, near the waterfall,
Which thunders down with headlong force,
Beneath the moon, yet shining fair,
As careless as if nothing were,                      350
Sits upright on a feeding horse?

Unto his horse--there feeding free,
He seems, I think, the rein to give;
Of moon or stars he takes no heed;
Of such we in romances read:
--'Tis Johnny! Johnny! as I live.

And that's the very Pony, too!
Where is she, where is Betty Foy?
She hardly can sustain her fears;
The roaring waterfall she hears,                    360
And cannot find her Idiot Boy.

Your Pony's worth his weight in gold:
Then calm your terrors, Betty Foy!
She's coming from among the trees,
And now all full in view she sees
Him whom she loves, her Idiot Boy.

And Betty sees the Pony too:
Why stand you thus, good Betty Foy?
It is no goblin, 'tis no ghost,
'Tis he whom you so long have lost,             370
He whom you love, your Idiot Boy.

She looks again--her arms are up--
She screams--she cannot move for joy;
She darts, as with a torrent's force,
She almost has o'erturned the Horse,
And fast she holds her Idiot Boy.

And Johnny burrs, and laughs aloud;
Whether in cunning or in joy
I cannot tell; but while he laughs,
Betty a drunken pleasure quaffs                 380
To hear again her Idiot Boy.

And now she's at the Pony's tail,
And now is at the Pony's head,--
On that side now, and now on this;
And, almost stifled with her bliss,
A few sad tears does Betty shed.

She kisses o'er and o'er again
Him whom she loves, her Idiot Boy;
She's happy here, is happy there,
She is uneasy every where;                      390
Her limbs are all alive with joy.

She pats the Pony, where or when
She knows not, happy Betty Foy!
The little Pony glad may be,
But he is milder far than she,
You hardly can perceive his joy.

"Oh! Johnny, never mind the Doctor;
You've done your best, and that is all:"
She took the reins, when this was said,
And gently turned the Pony's head           400
From the loud waterfall.

By this the stars were almost gone,
The moon was setting on the hill,
So pale you scarcely looked at her:
The little birds began to stir,
Though yet their tongues were still.

The Pony, Betty, and her Boy,
Wind slowly through the woody dale;
And who is she, betimes abroad,
That hobbles up the steep rough road?      410
Who is it, but old Susan Gale?

Long time lay Susan lost in thought;
And many dreadful fears beset her,
Both for her Messenger and Nurse;
And, as her mind grew worse and worse,
Her body--it grew better.

She turned, she tossed herself in bed,
On all sides doubts and terrors met her;
Point after point did she discuss;
And, while her mind was fighting thus,         420
Her body still grew better.

"Alas! what is become of them?
These fears can never be endured;
I'll to the wood."--The word scarce said,
Did Susan rise up from her bed,
As if by magic cured.

Away she goes up hill and down,
And to the wood at length is come;
She spies her Friends, she shouts a greeting;
Oh me! it is a merry meeting                           430
As ever was in Christendom.

The owls have hardly sung their last,
While our four travellers homeward wend;
The owls have hooted all night long,
And with the owls began my song,
And with the owls must end.

For while they all were travelling home,
Cried Betty, "Tell us, Johnny, do,
Where all this long night you have been,
What you have heard, what you have seen:     440
And, Johnny, mind you tell us true."

Now Johnny all night long had heard
The owls in tuneful concert strive;
No doubt too he the moon had seen;
For in the moonlight he had been
From eight o'clock till five.

And thus, to Betty's question, he
Made answer, like a traveller bold,
(His very words I give to you,)
"The cocks did crow to-whoo, to-whoo,        450
And the sun did shine so cold!" 
--Thus answered Johnny in his glory,
And that was all his travel's story,
1798.

COMPOSED UPON WESTMINSTER BRIDGE, SEPT. 3, 1802 

EARTH has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth, like a garment, wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;               10
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

LINES 
COMPOSED A FEW MILES ABOVE TINTERN ABBEY, ON REVISITING THE BANKS OF THE WYE DURING A TOUR. JULY 13, 1798

FIVE years have past; five summers, with the length
Of five long winters! and again I hear
These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs
With a soft inland murmur.--Once again
Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs,
That on a wild secluded scene impress
Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect
The landscape with the quiet of the sky.
The day is come when I again repose
Here, under this dark sycamore, and view                        10
These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts,
Which at this season, with their unripe fruits,
Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves
'Mid groves and copses. Once again I see
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines
Of sportive wood run wild: these pastoral farms,
Green to the very door; and wreaths of smoke
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees!
With some uncertain notice, as might seem
Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods,                     20
Or of some Hermit's cave, where by his fire
The Hermit sits alone.
These beauteous forms,
Through a long absence, have not been to me
As is a landscape to a blind man's eye:
But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din
Of towns and cities, I have owed to them
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet,
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart;
And passing even into my purer mind,
With tranquil restoration:--feelings too                              30
Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps,
As have no slight or trivial influence
On that best portion of a good man's life,
His little, nameless, unremembered, acts
Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust,
To them I may have owed another gift,
Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood,
In which the burthen of the mystery,
In which the heavy and the weary weight
Of all this unintelligible world,                                           40
Is lightened:--that serene and blessed mood,
In which the affections gently lead us on,--
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame
And even the motion of our human blood
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul:
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things.
If this
Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft--                             50
In darkness and amid the many shapes
Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir
Unprofitable, and the fever of the world,
Have hung upon the beatings of my heart--
How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee,
O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods,
How often has my spirit turned to thee!
And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought,
With many recognitions dim and faint,
And somewhat of a sad perplexity,                                  60
The picture of the mind revives again:
While here I stand, not only with the sense
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts
That in this moment there is life and food
For future years. And so I dare to hope,
Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first
I came among these hills; when like a doe
I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides
Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams,
Wherever nature led: more like a man                               70
Flying from something that he dreads, than one
Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then
(The coarser pleasures of my boyish days,
And their glad animal movements all gone by)
To me was all in all.--I cannot paint
What then I was. The sounding cataract
Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock,
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,
Their colours and their forms, were then to me
An appetite; a feeling and a love,                                      80
That had no need of a remoter charm,
By thought supplied, nor any interest
Unborrowed from the eye.--That time is past,
And all its aching joys are now no more,
And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this
Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur, other gifts
Have followed; for such loss, I would believe,
Abundant recompence. For I have learned
To look on nature, not as in the hour
Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes                      90
The still, sad music of humanity,
Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man;
A motion and a spirit, that impels                                    100
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still
A lover of the meadows and the woods,
And mountains; and of all that we behold
From this green earth; of all the mighty world
Of eye, and ear,--both what they half create,
And what perceive; well pleased to recognise
In nature and the language of the sense,
The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul                  110
Of all my moral being.
Nor perchance,
If I were not thus taught, should I the more
Suffer my genial spirits to decay:
For thou art with me here upon the banks
Of this fair river; thou my dearest Friend,
My dear, dear Friend; and in thy voice I catch
The language of my former heart, and read
My former pleasures in the shooting lights
Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little while
May I behold in thee what I was once,                           120
My dear, dear Sister! and this prayer I make,
Knowing that Nature never did betray
The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege,
Through all the years of this our life, to lead
From joy to joy: for she can so inform
The mind that is within us, so impress
With quietness and beauty, and so feed
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues,
Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men,
Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all                     130
The dreary intercourse of daily life,
Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb
Our cheerful faith, that all which we behold
Is full of blessings. Therefore let the moon
Shine on thee in thy solitary walk;
And let the misty mountain-winds be free
To blow against thee: and, in after years,
When these wild ecstasies shall be matured
Into a sober pleasure; when thy mind
Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms,                           140
Thy memory be as a dwelling-place
For all sweet sounds and harmonies; oh! then,
If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief,
Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts
Of tender joy wilt thou remember me,
And these my exhortations! Nor, perchance--
If I should be where I no more can hear
Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these gleams
Of past existence--wilt thou then forget
That on the banks of this delightful stream                       150
We stood together; and that I, so long
A worshipper of Nature, hither came
Unwearied in that service: rather say
With warmer love--oh! with far deeper zeal
Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget,
That after many wanderings, many years
Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs,
And this green pastoral landscape, were to me
More dear, both for themselves and for thy sake!
1798.

Ode
Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood

THERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,

    The earth, and every common sight,

            To me did seem

    Apparell'd in celestial light,

The glory and the freshness of a dream.

         5

It is not now as it hath been of yore;—

        Turn wheresoe'er I may,

            By night or day,

The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

        The rainbow comes and goes,

  10

        And lovely is the rose;

        The moon doth with delight

    Look round her when the heavens are bare;

        Waters on a starry night

        Are beautiful and fair;

  15

    The sunshine is a glorious birth;

    But yet I know, where'er I go,

That there hath pass'd away a glory from the earth.

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,

    And while the young lambs bound

  20

        As to the tabor's sound,

To me alone there came a thought of grief:

A timely utterance gave that thought relief,

        And I again am strong:

The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep;

  25

No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;

I hear the echoes through the mountains throng,

The winds come to me from the fields of sleep,

        And all the earth is gay;

            Land and sea

  30

    Give themselves up to jollity,

      And with the heart of May

    Doth every beast keep holiday;—

          Thou Child of Joy,

Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy

  35

    Shepherd-boy!

Ye blessèd creatures, I have heard the call

    Ye to each other make; I see

The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;

    My heart is at your festival,

  40

      My head hath its coronal,

The fulness of your bliss, I feel—I feel it all.

        O evil day! if I were sullen

        While Earth herself is adorning,

            This sweet May-morning,

  45

        And the children are culling

            On every side,

        In a thousand valleys far and wide,

        Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,

And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm:—

  50

        I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!

        —But there's a tree, of many, one,

A single field which I have look'd upon,

Both of them speak of something that is gone:

          The pansy at my feet

  55

          Doth the same tale repeat:

Whither is fled the visionary gleam?

Where is it now, the glory and the dream?

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:

The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,

  60

        Hath had elsewhere its setting,

          And cometh from afar:

        Not in entire forgetfulness,

        And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come

  65

        From God, who is our home:

Heaven lies about us in our infancy!

Shades of the prison-house begin to close

        Upon the growing Boy,

But he beholds the light, and whence it flows,

  70

        He sees it in his joy;

The Youth, who daily farther from the east

    Must travel, still is Nature's priest,

      And by the vision splendid

      Is on his way attended;

  75

At length the Man perceives it die away,

And fade into the light of common day.

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own;

Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,

And, even with something of a mother's mind,

  80

        And no unworthy aim,

    The homely nurse doth all she can

To make her foster-child, her Inmate Man,

    Forget the glories he hath known,

And that imperial palace whence he came.

  85

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,

A six years' darling of a pigmy size!

See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,

Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses,

With light upon him from his father's eyes!

  90

See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,

Some fragment from his dream of human life,

Shaped by himself with newly-learnèd art;

    A wedding or a festival,

    A mourning or a funeral;

  95

        And this hath now his heart,

    And unto this he frames his song:

        Then will he fit his tongue

To dialogues of business, love, or strife;

        But it will not be long

 100

        Ere this be thrown aside,

        And with new joy and pride

The little actor cons another part;

Filling from time to time his 'humorous stage'

With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,

 105

That Life brings with her in her equipage;

        As if his whole vocation

        Were endless imitation.

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie

        Thy soul's immensity;

 110

Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep

Thy heritage, thou eye among the blind,

That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,

Haunted for ever by the eternal mind,—

        Mighty prophet! Seer blest!

 115

        On whom those truths do rest,

Which we are toiling all our lives to find,

In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave;

Thou, over whom thy Immortality

Broods like the Day, a master o'er a slave,

 120

A presence which is not to be put by;

          To whom the grave

Is but a lonely bed without the sense or sight

        Of day or the warm light,

A place of thought where we in waiting lie;

 125

Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might

Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height,

Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke

The years to bring the inevitable yoke,

Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife?

 130

Full soon thy soul shall have her earthly freight,

And custom lie upon thee with a weight,

Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!

        O joy! that in our embers

        Is something that doth live,

 135

        That nature yet remembers

        What was so fugitive!

The thought of our past years in me doth breed

Perpetual benediction: not indeed

For that which is most worthy to be blest—

 140

Delight and liberty, the simple creed

Of childhood, whether busy or at rest,

With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:—

        Not for these I raise

        The song of thanks and praise;

 145

    But for those obstinate questionings

    Of sense and outward things,

    Fallings from us, vanishings;

    Blank misgivings of a Creature

Moving about in worlds not realized,

 150

High instincts before which our mortal Nature

Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised:

        But for those first affections,

        Those shadowy recollections,

      Which, be they what they may,

 155

Are yet the fountain-light of all our day,

Are yet a master-light of all our seeing;

  Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make

Our noisy years seem moments in the being

Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake,

 160

            To perish never:

Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,

            Nor Man nor Boy,

Nor all that is at enmity with joy,

Can utterly abolish or destroy!

 165

    Hence in a season of calm weather

        Though inland far we be,

Our souls have sight of that immortal sea

        Which brought us hither,

    Can in a moment travel thither,

 170

And see the children sport upon the shore,

And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.

Then sing, ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song!

        And let the young lambs bound

        As to the tabor's sound!

 175

We in thought will join your throng,

      Ye that pipe and ye that play,

      Ye that through your hearts to-day

      Feel the gladness of the May!

What though the radiance which was once so bright

 180

Be now for ever taken from my sight,

    Though nothing can bring back the hour

Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;

      We will grieve not, rather find

      Strength in what remains behind;

 185

      In the primal sympathy

      Which having been must ever be;

      In the soothing thoughts that spring

      Out of human suffering;

      In the faith that looks through death,

 190

In years that bring the philosophic mind.

And O ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,

Forebode not any severing of our loves!

Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;

I only have relinquish'd one delight

 195

To live beneath your more habitual sway.

I love the brooks which down their channels fret,

Even more than when I tripp'd lightly as they;

The innocent brightness of a new-born Day

            Is lovely yet;

 200

The clouds that gather round the setting sun

Do take a sober colouring from an eye

That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality;

Another race hath been, and other palms are won.

Thanks to the human heart by which we live,

 205

Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,

To me the meanest flower that blows can give

Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 1772–1834

549. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

PART I

An ancient Mariner meeteth three gallants bidden to a wedding feast, and detaineth one.

 IT is an ancient Mariner,

 And he stoppeth one of three.

 'By thy long beard and glittering eye,

 Now wherefore stopp'st thou me?

 The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide,

         5

 And I am next of kin;

 The guests are met, the feast is set:

 May'st hear the merry din.'

 He holds him with his skinny hand,

 'There was a ship,' quoth he.

  10

 'Hold off! unhand me, grey-beard loon!'

 Eftsoons his hand dropt he.

The Wedding-Guest is spell-bound by the eye of the old seafaring man, and constrained to hear his tale.

 He holds him with his glittering eye—

 The Wedding-Guest stood still,

 And listens like a three years' child:

  15

 The Mariner hath his will.

 The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone:

 He cannot choose but hear;

 And thus spake on that ancient man,

 The bright-eyed Mariner.

  20

 'The ship was cheer'd, the harbour clear'd,

 Merrily did we drop

 Below the kirk, below the hill,

 Below the lighthouse top.

The Mariner tells how the ship sailed southward with a good wind and fair weather, till it reached the Line.

 The Sun came up upon the left,

  25

 Out of the sea came he!

 And he shone bright, and on the right

 Went down into the sea.

 Higher and higher every day,

 Till over the mast at noon——'

  30

 The Wedding-Guest here beat his breast,

 For he heard the loud bassoon.

The Wedding-Guest heareth the bridal music; but the Mariner continueth his tale.

 The bride hath paced into the hall,

 Red as a rose is she;

 Nodding their heads before her goes

  35

 The merry minstrelsy.

 The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast,

 Yet he cannot choose but hear;

 And thus spake on that ancient man,

 The bright-eyed Mariner.

  40

The ship drawn by a storm toward the South Pole.

 'And now the Storm-blast came, and he

 Was tyrannous and strong:

 He struck with his o'ertaking wings,

 And chased us south along.

 With sloping masts and dipping prow,

  45

 As who pursued with yell and blow

 Still treads the shadow of his foe,

 And forward bends his head,

 The ship drove fast, loud roar'd the blast,

 The southward aye we fled.

  50

 And now there came both mist and snow,

 And it grew wondrous cold:

 And ice, mast-high, came floating by,

 As green as emerald.

The land of ice, and of fearful sounds, where no living thing was to be seen.

 And through the drifts the snowy clifts

  55

 Did send a dismal sheen:

 Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—

 The ice was all between.

 The ice was here, the ice was there,

 The ice was all around:

  60

 It crack'd and growl'd, and roar'd and howl'd,

 Like noises in a swound!

Till a great sea-bird, called the Albatross, came through the snow-fog, and was received with great joy and hospitality.

 At length did cross an Albatross,

 Thorough the fog it came;

 As if it had been a Christian soul,

  65

 We hail'd it in God's name.

 It ate the food it ne'er had eat,

 And round and round it flew.

 The ice did split with a thunder-fit;

 The helmsman steer'd us through!

  70

And lo! the Albatross proveth a bird of good omen, and followeth the ship as it returned northward through fog and floating ice.

 And a good south wind sprung up behind;

 The Albatross did follow,

 And every day, for food or play,

 Came to the mariners' hollo!

 In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud,

  75

 It perch'd for vespers nine;

 Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white,

 Glimmer'd the white moonshine.'

The ancient Mariner inhospitably killeth the pious bird of good omen.

 'God save thee, ancient Mariner!

 From the fiends, that plague thee thus!—

  80

 Why look'st thou so?'—'With my crossbow

 I shot the Albatross.

PART II

 'The Sun now rose upon the right:

 Out of the sea came he,

 Still hid in mist, and on the left

  85

 Went down into the sea.

 And the good south wind still blew behind,

 But no sweet bird did follow,

 Nor any day for food or play

 Came to the mariners' hollo!

  90

His shipmates cry out against the ancient Mariner for killing the bird of good luck.

 And I had done an hellish thing,

 And it would work 'em woe:

 For all averr'd, I had kill'd the bird

 That made the breeze to blow.

 Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay,

  95

 That made the breeze to blow!

But when the fog cleared off, they justify the same, and thus make themselves accomplices in the crime.

 Nor dim nor red, like God's own head,

 The glorious Sun uprist:

 Then all averr'd, I had kill'd the bird

 That brought the fog and mist.

 100

 'Twas right, said they, such birds to slay,

 That bring the fog and mist.

The fair breeze continues; the ship enters the Pacific Ocean, and sails northward, even till it reaches the Line.

 The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,

 The furrow follow'd free;

 We were the first that ever burst

 105

 Into that silent sea.

The ship hath been suddenly becalmed.

 Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down,

 'Twas sad as sad could be;

 And we did speak only to break

 The silence of the sea!

 110

 All in a hot and copper sky,

 The bloody Sun, at noon,

 Right up above the mast did stand,

 No bigger than the Moon.

 Day after day, day after day,

 115

 We stuck, nor breath nor motion;

 As idle as a painted ship

 Upon a painted ocean.

And the Albatross begins to be avenged.

 Water, water, everywhere,

 And all the boards did shrink;

 120

 Water, water, everywhere,

 Nor any drop to drink.

 The very deep did rot: O Christ!

 That ever this should be!

 Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs

 125

 Upon the slimy sea.

 About, about, in reel and rout

 The death-fires danced at night;

 The water, like a witch's oils,

 Burnt green, and blue, and white.

 130

A Spirit had followed them; one of the invisible inhabitants of this planet, neither departed souls nor angels; concerning whom the learned Jew, Josephus, and the Platonic Constantinopolitan, Michael Psellus, may be consulted. They are very numerous, and there is no climate or element without one or more.

 And some in dreams assuréd were

 Of the Spirit that plagued us so;

 Nine fathom deep he had followed us

 From the land of mist and snow.

 And every tongue, through utter drought,

 135

 Was wither'd at the root;

 We could not speak, no more than if

 We had been choked with soot.

The shipmates in their sore distress, would fain throw the whole guilt on the ancient Mariner: in sign whereof they hang the dead sea-bird round his neck.

 Ah! well a-day! what evil looks

 Had I from old and young!

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 Instead of the cross, the Albatross

 About my neck was hung.

PART III

 'There passed a weary time. Each throat

 Was parch'd, and glazed each eye.

 A weary time! a weary time!

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 How glazed each weary eye!

The ancient Mariner beholdeth a sign in the element afar off.

 When looking westward, I beheld

 A something in the sky.

 At first it seem'd a little speck,

 And then it seem'd a mist;

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 It moved and moved, and took at last

 A certain shape, I wist.

 A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist!

 And still it near'd and near'd:

 As if it dodged a water-sprite,

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 It plunged, and tack'd, and veer'd.

At its nearer approach, it seemeth him to be a ship; and at a dear ransom he freeth his speech from the bonds of thirst.

 With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,

 We could nor laugh nor wail;

 Through utter drought all dumb we stood!

 I bit my arm, I suck'd the blood,

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 And cried, A sail! a sail!

 With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,

 Agape they heard me call:

A flash of joy;

 Gramercy! they for joy did grin,

 And all at once their breath drew in,

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 As they were drinking all.

And horror follows. For can it be a ship that comes onward without wind or tide?

 See! see! (I cried) she tacks no more!

 Hither to work us weal—

 Without a breeze, without a tide,

 She steadies with upright keel!

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 The western wave was all aflame,

 The day was wellnigh done!

 Almost upon the western wave

 Rested the broad, bright Sun;

 When that strange shape drove suddenly

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 Betwixt us and the Sun.

It seemeth him but the skeleton of a ship.

 And straight the Sun was fleck'd with bars

 (Heaven's Mother send us grace!),

 As if through a dungeon-grate he peer'd

 With broad and burning face.

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 Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat loud)

 How fast she nears and nears!

 Are those her sails that glance in the Sun,

 Like restless gossameres?

And its ribs are seen as bars on the face of the setting Sun. The Spectre-Woman and her Death-mate, and no other on board the skeleton ship. Like vessel, like crew!

 Are those her ribs through which the Sun

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 Did peer, as through a grate?

 And is that Woman all her crew?

 Is that a Death? and are there two?

 Is Death that Woman's mate?

 Her lips were red, her looks were free,

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 Her locks were yellow as gold:

 Her skin was as white as leprosy,

 The Nightmare Life-in-Death was she,

 Who thicks man's blood with cold.

Death and Life-in-Death have diced for the ship's crew, and she (the latter) winneth the ancient Mariner.

 The naked hulk alongside came,

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 And the twain were casting dice;

 "The game is done! I've won! I've won!"

 Quoth she, and whistles thrice.

No twilight within the courts of the Sun.

 The Sun's rim dips; the stars rush out:

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 At one stride comes the dark;

 With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea,

 Off shot the spectre-bark.

 We listen'd and look'd sideways up!

 Fear at my heart, as at a cup,

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 My life-blood seem'd to sip!

 The stars were dim, and thick the night,

 The steersman's face by his lamp gleam'd white;

 From the sails the dew did drip—

At the rising of the Moon,

 Till clomb above the eastern bar

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 The hornéd Moon, with one bright star

 Within the nether tip.

One after another,

 One after one, by the star-dogg'd Moon,

 Too quick for groan or sigh,

 Each turn'd his face with a ghastly pang,

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 And cursed me with his eye.

His shipmates drop down dead.

 Four times fifty living men

 (And I heard nor sigh nor groan),

 With heavy thump, a lifeless lump,

 They dropp'd down one by one.

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But Life-in-Death begins her work on the ancient Mariner.

 The souls did from their bodies fly—

 They fled to bliss or woe!

 And every soul, it pass'd me by

 Like the whizz of my crossbow!'

Part Four

The Wedding-Guest feareth that a spirit is talking to him;

 'I fear thee, ancient Mariner!

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 I fear thy skinny hand!

 And thou art long, and lank, and brown,

 As is the ribb'd sea-sand.

 I fear thee and thy glittering eye,

 And thy skinny hand so brown.'—

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But the ancient Mariner assureth him of his bodily life, and proceedeth to relate his horrible penance.

 'Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding-Guest!

 This body dropt not down.

 Alone, alone, all, all alone,

 Alone on a wide, wide sea!

 And never a saint took pity on

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 My soul in agony.

He despiseth the creatures of the calm.

 The many men, so beautiful!

 And they all dead did lie:

 And a thousand thousand slimy things

 Lived on; and so did I.

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And envieth that they should live, and so many lie dead.

 I look'd upon the rotting sea,

 And drew my eyes away;

 I look'd upon the rotting deck,

 And there the dead men lay.

 I look'd to heaven, and tried to pray;

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 But or ever a prayer had gusht,

 A wicked whisper came, and made

 My heart as dry as dust.

 I closed my lids, and kept them close,

 And the balls like pulses beat;

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 For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky,

 Lay like a load on my weary eye,

 And the dead were at my feet.

But the curse liveth for him in the eye of the dead men.

 The cold sweat melted from their limbs,

 Nor rot nor reek did they:

 255

 The look with which they look'd on me

 Had never pass'd away.

 An orphan's curse would drag to hell

 A spirit from on high;

 But oh! more horrible than that

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 Is the curse in a dead man's eye!

 Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,

 And yet I could not die.

In his loneliness and fixedness he yearneth towards the journeying Moon, and the stars that still sojourn, yet still move onward; and everywhere the blue sky belongs to them, and is their appointed rest and their native country and their own natural homes, which they enter unannounced, as lords that are certainly expected, and yet there is a silent joy at their arrival.

 The moving Moon went up the sky,

 And nowhere did abide;

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 Softly she was going up,

 And a star or two beside—

 Her beams bemock'd the sultry main,

 Like April hoar-frost spread;

 But where the ship's huge shadow lay,

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 The charméd water burnt alway

 A still and awful red.

By the light of the Moon he beholdeth God's creatures of the great calm.

 Beyond the shadow of the ship,

 I watch'd the water-snakes:

 They moved in tracks of shining white,

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 And when they rear'd, the elfish light

 Fell off in hoary flakes.

 Within the shadow of the ship

 I watch'd their rich attire:

 Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,

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 They coil'd and swam; and every track

 Was a flash of golden fire.

Their beauty and their happiness.

 O happy living things! no tongue

 Their beauty might declare:

 A spring of love gush'd from my heart,

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He blesseth them in his heart.

 And I bless'd them unaware:

 Sure my kind saint took pity on me,

 And I bless'd them unaware.

The spell begins to break.

 The selfsame moment I could pray;

 And from my neck so free

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 The Albatross fell off, and sank

 Like lead into the sea.

PART V

 'O sleep! it is a gentle thing,

 Beloved from pole to pole!

 To Mary Queen the praise be given!

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 She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven,

 That slid into my soul.

By grace of the holy Mother, the ancient Mariner is refreshed with rain.

 The silly buckets on the deck,

 That had so long remain'd,

 I dreamt that they were fill'd with dew;

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 And when I awoke, it rain'd.

 My lips were wet, my throat was cold,

 My garments all were dank;

 Sure I had drunken in my dreams,

 And still my body drank.

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 I moved, and could not feel my limbs:

 I was so light—almost

 I thought that I had died in sleep,

 And was a blesséd ghost.

He heareth sounds and seeth strange sights and commotions in the sky and the element.

 And soon I heard a roaring wind:

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 It did not come anear;

 But with its sound it shook the sails,

 That were so thin and sere.

 The upper air burst into life;

 And a hundred fire-flags sheen;

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 To and fro they were hurried about!

 And to and fro, and in and out,

 The wan stars danced between.

 And the coming wind did roar more loud,

 And the sails did sigh like sedge;

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 And the rain pour'd down from one black cloud;

 The Moon was at its edge.

 The thick black cloud was cleft, and still

 The Moon was at its side;

 Like waters shot from some high crag,

 325

 The lightning fell with never a jag,

 A river steep and wide.

The bodies of the ship's crew are inspired, and the ship moves on;

 The loud wind never reach'd the ship,

 Yet now the ship moved on!

 Beneath the lightning and the Moon

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 The dead men gave a groan.

 They groan'd, they stirr'd, they all uprose,

 Nor spake, nor moved their eyes;

 It had been strange, even in a dream,

 To have seen those dead men rise.

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 The helmsman steer'd, the ship moved on;

 Yet never a breeze up-blew;

 The mariners all 'gan work the ropes,

 Where they were wont to do;

 They raised their limbs like lifeless tools—

 340

 We were a ghastly crew.

 The body of my brother's son

 Stood by me, knee to knee:

 The body and I pull'd at one rope,

 But he said naught to me.'

 345

But not by the souls of the men, nor by demons of earth or middle air, but by a blessed troop of angelic spirits, sent down by the invocation of the guardian saint.

 'I fear thee, ancient Mariner!'

 Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest:

 'Twas not those souls that fled in pain,

 Which to their corses came again,

 But a troop of spirits blest:

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 For when it dawn'd—they dropp'd their arms,

 And cluster'd round the mast;

 Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths,

 And from their bodies pass'd.

 Around, around, flew each sweet sound,

 355

 Then darted to the Sun;

 Slowly the sounds came back again,

 Now mix'd, now one by one.

 Sometimes a-dropping from the sky

 I heard the skylark sing;

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 Sometimes all little birds that are,

 How they seem'd to fill the sea and air

 With their sweet jargoning!

 And now 'twas like all instruments,

 Now like a lonely flute;

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 And now it is an angel's song,

 That makes the Heavens be mute.

 It ceased; yet still the sails made on

 A pleasant noise till noon,

 A noise like of a hidden brook

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 In the leafy month of June,

 That to the sleeping woods all night

 Singeth a quiet tune.

 Till noon we quietly sail'd on,

 Yet never a breeze did breathe:

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 Slowly and smoothly went the ship,

 Moved onward from beneath.

The lonesome Spirit from the South Pole carries on the ship as far as the Line, in obedience to the angelic troop, but still requireth vengeance.

 Under the keel nine fathom deep,

 From the land of mist and snow,

 The Spirit slid: and it was he

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 That made the ship to go.

 The sails at noon left off their tune,

 And the ship stood still also.

 The Sun, right up above the mast,

 Had fix'd her to the ocean:

 385

 But in a minute she 'gan stir,

 With a short uneasy motion—

 Backwards and forwards half her length

 With a short uneasy motion.

 Then like a pawing horse let go,

 390

 She made a sudden bound:

 It flung the blood into my head,

 And I fell down in a swound.

The Polar Spirit's fellow-demons, the invisible inhabitants of the element, take part in his wrong; and two of them relate, one to the other, that penance long and heavy for the ancient Mariner hath been accorded to the Polar Spirit, who returneth southward.

 How long in that same fit I lay,

 I have not to declare;

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 But ere my living life return'd,

 I heard, and in my soul discern'd

 Two voices in the air.

 "Is it he?" quoth one, "is this the man?

 By Him who died on cross,

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 With his cruel bow he laid full low

 The harmless Albatross.

 The Spirit who bideth by himself

 In the land of mist and snow,

 He loved the bird that loved the man

 405

 Who shot him with his bow."

 The other was a softer voice,

 As soft as honey-dew:

 Quoth he, "The man hath penance done,

 And penance more will do."

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PART VI

 First Voice: '"But tell me, tell me! speak again,

 Thy soft response renewing—

 What makes that ship drive on so fast?

 What is the Ocean doing?"

 Second Voice: "Still as a slave before his lord,

 415

 The Ocean hath no blast;

 His great bright eye most silently

 Up to the Moon is cast—

 If he may know which way to go;

 For she guides him smooth or grim.

 420

 See, brother, see! how graciously

 She looketh down on him."

The Mariner hath been cast into a trance; for the angelic power causeth the vessel to drive northward faster than human life could endure.

 First Voice: "But why drives on that ship so fast,

 Without or wave or wind?"

 Second Voice: "The air is cut away before,

 425

 And closes from behind.

 Fly, brother, fly! more high, more high!

 Or we shall be belated:

 For slow and slow that ship will go,

 When the Mariner's trance is abated.'

 430

The supernatural motion is retarded; the Mariner awakes, and his penance begins anew.

 I woke, and we were sailing on

 As in a gentle weather:

 'Twas night, calm night, the Moon was high;

 The dead men stood together.

 All stood together on the deck,

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 For a charnel-dungeon fitter:

 All fix'd on me their stony eyes,

 That in the Moon did glitter.

 The pang, the curse, with which they died,

 Had never pass'd away:

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 I could not draw my eyes from theirs,

 Nor turn them up to pray.

The curse is finally expiated.

 And now this spell was snapt: once more

 I viewed the ocean green,

 And look'd far forth, yet little saw

 445

 Of what had else been seen—

 Like one that on a lonesome road

 Doth walk in fear and dread,

 And having once turn'd round, walks on,

 And turns no more his head;

 450

 Because he knows a frightful fiend

 Doth close behind him tread.

 But soon there breathed a wind on me,

 Nor sound nor motion made:

 Its path was not upon the sea,

 455

 In ripple or in shade.

 It raised my hair, it fann'd my cheek

 Like a meadow-gale of spring—

 It mingled strangely with my fears,