O golden-tongued Romance with serene lute!

Bring me a tablet whiter than a star,Or hand of hymning angel, when ’tis seenThe silver strings of heavenly harp atween:And let there glide by many a pearly carPink robes, and wavy hair, and diamond jar,And half-discovered wings, and glances keen.The while let music wander round my ears,And as it reaches each delicious ending,Let me…

You may do so sans objectionTill the day of resurrection:For, bless my beard, they aye shall beMy beloved Trinity.

Not like the formal crest of latter days:But bending in a thousand graceful ways;So graceful, that it seems no mortal hand,Or e’en the touch of Archimago’s wand,Could charm them into such an attitude.We must think rather, that in playful mood,Some mountain breeze had turned its chief delight,To show this wonder of its gentle might.Lo! I…

Or I shall think you knowing;And if you smile the blushing while,Then maidenheads are going.2.There’s a blush for want, and a blush for shan’t,And a blush for having done it;There’s a blush for thought, and a blush for nought,And a blush for just begun it.3.O sigh not so! O sigh not so!For it sounds of…

Then one poor year a thousand years would be,The flush of welcome ever on the cheek:So could we live long life in little space,So time itself would be annihilate,So a day’s journey in oblivious hazeTo serve ourjoys would lengthen and dilate.O to arrive each Monday morn from Ind!To land each Tuesday from the rich Levant!In…

Fetter’d, in spite of pained loveliness;Let us find out, if we must be constrain’d,Sandals more interwoven and completeTo fit the naked foot of poesy;Let us inspect the lyre, and weigh the stressOf every chord, and see what may be gain’dBy ear industrious, and attention meet:Misers of sound and syllable, no lessThan Midas of his coinage,…

Round many western islands have I beenWhich bards in fealty to Apollo hold.Oft of one wide expanse had I been toldThat deep-brow’d Homer ruled as his demesne;Yet did I never breathe its pure sereneTill I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:Then felt I like some watcher of the skiesWhen a new planet swims into…

I mount for ever—not an atom lessThan the proud laurel shall content my bier.No! by the eternal stars! or why sit hereIn the Sun’s eye, and ‘gainst my temples pressApollo’s very leaves, woven to blessBy thy white fingers and thy spirit clear.Lo! who dares say, ‘Do this’? Who dares call downMy will from its high…

And watching, with eternal lids apart,Like Nature’s patient sleepless Eremite,The moving waters at their priestlike taskOf pure ablution round earth’s human shores,Or gazing on the new soft fallen maskOf snow upon the mountains and the moors –No -yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,Pillowed upon my fair love’s ripening breast,To feel for ever its soft fall and…

SCENE I. Field of Battle.Alarum. Enter King STEPHEN, Knights, and Soldiers.Stephen. If shame can on a soldier’s vein-swoll’n frontSpread deeper crimson than the battle’s toil,Blush in your casing helmets! for see, see!Yonder my chivalry, my pride of war,Wrench’d with an iron hand from firm array,Are routed loose about the plashy meads,Of honour forfeit. O that…

SCENE I.A part of the Forest.Enter CONRAD and AURANTHE.Auranthe. Go no further; not a step more; thou artA master-plague in the midst of miseries.Go I fear thee. I tremble every limb,Who never shook before. There’s moody deathIn thy resolved looks Yes, I could kneelTo pray thee far away. Conrad, go, goThere! yonder underneath the boughs…

The natural hue of health, from vermeil lips?–To give maiden blushesTo the white rose bushes?Or is it thy dewy hand the daisy tips?O Sorrow!Why dost borrowThe lustrous passion from a falcon-eye?–To give the glow-worm light?Or, on a moonless night,To tinge, on siren shores, the salt sea-spry?O Sorrow!Why dost borrowThe mellow ditties from a mourning tongue?–To…

It should be rich and sombre, and the moon,Just in its mid-life in the midst of June,Should look thro’ four large windows and displayClear, but for gold-fish vases in the way,Their glassy diamonding on Turkish floor;The tapers keep aside, an hour and more,To see what else the moon alone can show;While the night-breeze doth softly…

To those who woo her with too slavish knees,But makes surrender to some thoughtless boy,And dotes the more upon a heart at ease;She is a Gipsey,–will not speak to thoseWho have not learnt to be content without her;A Jilt, whose ear was never whisper’d close,Who thinks they scandal her who talk about her;A very Gipsey…

Bring me a tablet whiter than a star,Or hand of hymning angel, when ’tis seenThe silver strings of heavenly harp atween:And let there glide by many a pearly carPink robes, and wavy hair, and diamond jar,And half-discovered wings, and glances keen.The while let music wander round my ears,And as it reaches each delicious ending,Let me…

Of murky buildings: climb with me the steep,—Nature’s observatory—whence the dell,In flowery slopes, its river’s crystal swell,May seem a span; let me thy vigils keep‘Mongst boughs pavilioned, where the deer’s swift leapStartles the wild bee from the foxglove bell.But though I’ll gladly trace these scenes with thee,Yet the sweet converse of an innocent mind,Whose words…

And each imagined pinnacle and steepOf godlike hardship tells me I must dieLike a sick eagle looking at the sky.Yet ’tis a gentle luxury to weep,That I have not the cloudy winds to keepFresh for the opening of the morning’s eye.Such dim-conceived glories of the brainBring round the heart an indescribable feud;So do these wonders…

Thy branches ne’er rememberTheir green felicity:The north cannot undo themWith a sleety whistle through them;Nor frozen thawings glue themFrom budding at the prime.In drear-nighted December,Too happy, happy brook,Thy bubblings ne’er rememberApollo’s summer look;But with a sweet forgetting,They stay their crystal fretting,Never, never pettingAbout the frozen time.Ah! would ’twere so with manyA gentle girl and boy!But…

The stars look very cold about the sky,And I have many miles on foot to fare.Yet feel I little of the cool bleak air,Or of the dead leaves rustling drearily,Or of those silver lamps that burn on high,Or of the distance from home’s pleasant lair:For I am brimfull of the friendlinessThat in a little cottage…

Ye tight little fairy, just fresh from the dairy,Will ye give me some cream if I ask it?I love your meads, and I love your flowers,And I love your junkets mainly,But ‘hind the door, I love kissing more,O look not so disdainly!I love your hills, and I love your dales,And I love your flocks a-bleating;But…

It should be rich and sombre, and the moon,Just in its mid-life in the midst of June,Should look thro’ four large windows and displayClear, but for gold-fish vases in the way,Their glassy diamonding on Turkish floor;The tapers keep aside, an hour and more,To see what else the moon alone can show;While the night-breeze doth softly…

Before high-piled books, in charactery,Hold like rich garners the full ripen’d grain;When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face,Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,And think that I may never live to traceTheir shadows, with the magic hand of chance;And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,That I shall never look upon thee more,Never…

Haply a Halo round the Moon a gleeCircling from three sweet pair of Lips in Mirth;And haply you will say the dewy birthOf morning Roses ripplings tenderlySpread by the Halcyon’s breast upon the SeaBut these Comparisons are nothing worthThen is there nothing in the world so fair?The silvery tears of April? Youth of May?Or June…

Fetter’d, in spite of pained loveliness;Let us find out, if we must be constrain’d,Sandals more interwoven and completeTo fit the naked foot of poesy;Let us inspect the lyre, and weigh the stressOf every chord, and see what may be gain’dBy ear industrious, and attention meet:Misers of sound and syllable, no lessThan Midas of his coinage,…