What shall I do for the land that bred me,

The bright boroughs, the circle-citadels there!Down in dim woods the diamond delves! the elves’-eyes!The grey lawns cold where gold, where quickgold lies!Wind-beat whitebeam! airy abeles set on a flare!Flake-doves sent floating forth at a farmyard scare! —Ah well! it is all a purchase, all is a prize.Buy then! bid then! — What? — Prayer, patience,…

To me, so arch-especial a spirit as heaves in Henry Purcell,An age is now since passed, since parted; with the reversalOf the outward sentence low lays him, listed to a heresy, here.Not mood in him nor meaning, proud fire or sacred fear,Or love or pity or all that sweet notes not his might nursle:It is…

To take His lovely likeness more and more.It will not well, so she would bring aboutAn ever brighter burnish than beforeAnd turns to wash it from her welling eyesAnd breathes the blots off all with sighs on sighs.Her glass is blest but she as good as blindHolds till hand aches and wonders what is there;Her…

Wants war, wants wounds; weary his times, his tasks;To do without, take tosses, and obey.Rare patience roots in these, and, these away,Nowhere. Natural heart’s ivy, Patience masksOur ruins of wrecked past purpose. There she basksPurple eyes and seas of liquid leaves all day.We hear our hearts grate on themselves: it killsTo bruise them dearer. Yet…

Leaves, like the things of man, youWith your fresh thoughts care for, can you?Ah! as the heart grows olderIt will come to such sights colderBy and by, nor spare a sighThough worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;And yet you will weep and know why.Now no matter, child, the name:Sorrow’s springs are the same.Nor mouth had, no…

Rowing, I reach’d a rock – the sea was low –Which the tides cover in their overflow,Marking the spot, when they have gurgled o’er,With a thin floating veil of water hoar.A mile astern lay the blue shores away;And it was at the setting of the day.Plum-purple was the west; but spikes of lightSpear’d open lustrous…