TO A NIGHTINGALE

Y heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains

My My sense, as though of hemlock I had

Μ

drunk,

Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains

One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
But being too happy in thy happiness,—

That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees,
In some melodious plot

Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,
Singest of summer in full-throated ease.

O for a draught of vintage, that hath been
Cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth,
Tasting of Flora and the country green,
Dance, and Provençal song, and sun-burnt
mirth!

O for a beaker full of the warm South,
Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,
With beaded bubbles winking at the brim,
And purple-stained mouth;

That I might drink and leave the world unseen,

And with thee fade away into the forest dim:

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget

What thou among the leaves hast never known, The weariness, the fever, and the fret

Here, where men sit and hear each other

groan;

Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and

dies;

Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
And leaden-eyed despairs;

Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,
Or new Love pine at them beyond to-mor-

row.

Away! away! for I will fly to thee,

Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards, But on the viewless wings of Poesy,

Though the dull brain perplexes and retards: Already with thee! tender is the night,

And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne, Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays; But here there is no light,

Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown

Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy ways.

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,
Nor what 'soft incense hangs upon the boughs,
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet
Wherewith the seasonable month endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild;
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine;
Fast-fading violets cover'd up in leaves;
And mid-May's eldest child,

The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,
The murmurous haunt of flies on Summer

eves.

Darkling I listen; and for many a time

I have been half in love with easeful Death, Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme, To take into the air my quiet breath;

Now more than ever seems it rich to die,

To cease upon the midnight with no pain, While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad

In such an ecstasy!

Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain

To thy high requiem become a sod.

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!
No hungry generations tread thee down;
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown:
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path

Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,

She stood in tears amid the alien corn;

The same that oft-times hath

Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam

Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.

Forlorn! the very word is like a bell

To toll me back from thee to my sole self! Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well

As she is famed to do, deceiving elf. Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades Past the near meadows, over the still stream, Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep In the next valley-glades:

Was it a vision or a waking dream?

Fled is that music:- do I wake or sleep?
John Keats

WHEN LILACS LAST IN THE DOORYARD

TH

BLOOM'D

HEN with the knowledge of death as walking one side of me,

And the thought of death close-walking the other side of me,

And I in the middle, as with companions and as holding the hands of companions. I fled forth to the hiding receiving night, that talks not,

Down to the shores of the water, the path by the swamp in the dimness,

To the solemn shadowy cedars, and ghostly pines so still.

And the singer so shy to the rest receiv'd me; The gray-brown bird I know receiv'd us comrades three;

And he sang what seem'd the carol of death, and a verse for him I love.

From deep secluded recesses,

From the fragrant cedars, and the ghostly pines so still,

Came the carol of the bird.

And the charm of the carol rapt me,

As I held, as if by their hands, my comrades in

the night;

And the voice of my spirit tallied the song of the bird.

Come, lovely and soothing Death,

Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving,

In the day, in the night, to all, to each,
Sooner or later, delicate Death.

Prais'd be the fathomless universe,

For life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious;

And for love, sweet love - But praise! praise! praise!

For the sure-enwinding arms of cool-enfolding Death.

Dark Mother, always gliding near, with soft feet,

Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome?

Then I chant it for thee-I glorify thee above all;

I bring thee a song that when thou must indeed come, come unfalteringly.

Approach, strong Deliveress!

When it is so- when thou hast taken them, I joyously sing the dead,

Lost in the loving floating ocean of thee, Laved in the flood of thy bliss, O Death.

From me to thee, glad serenades, Dances for thee I propose, saluting thee adornments and feastings for thee; And the sights of the open landscape, and the high-spread sky, are fitting,

And life and the fields, and the huge and thoughtful night.