He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear
Takes in all beauty with an easy span:
He has his Summer, when luxuriously
Spring's honey'd cud of youthful thought
he loves

To ruminate, and by such dreaming high
Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves
His soul has in its Autumn, when his
wings

He furleth close; contented so to look
On mists in idleness-to let fair things
Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook.
He has his Winter too of pale misfeature,
Or else he would forego his mortal na-
?... 1819.

ture.

TO HOMER

STANDING aloof in giant ignorance,
Of thee I hear and of the Cyclades,
As one who sits ashore and longs per-
chance

To visit Dolphin-coral in deep seas.
So thou wast blind;-but then the veil
was rent,

For Jove uncurtained Heaven to let thee live,

And Neptune made for thee a spumy

tent.

And Pan made sing for thee his foresthive.

Aye, on the shores of darkness there is light,

And precipices show untrodden green, There is a budding morrow in midnight,1

There is a triple sight in blindness keen; Such seeing hadst thou, as it once befell

To Dian, Queen of Earth, and Heaven, and Hell. 1818. 1848.

1 Forman records in his notes that Rossetti considered this to be “Keats' finest single line of poetry." (Keats' Works, II., 238.)

LINES ON

THE MERMAID TAVERN

SOULS of Poets dead and gone,
What Elysium have ye known,
Happy field or mossy cavern.
Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern?
Have ye tippled drink more fine
Than mine host's Canary wine?
Or are fruits of Paradise
Sweeter than those dainty pies
Of venison? O generous food!
Drest as though bold Robin Hood
Would, with his maid Marian,
Sup and bowse from horn and can.

I have heard that on a day
Mine host's sign-board flew away,
Nobody knew whither, till
An astrologer's old quill
To a sheepskin gave the story,
Said he saw you in your glory,
Underneath a new old sign
Sipping beverage divine,

And pledging with contented smack
The Mermaid in the Zodiac.

Souls of Poets dead and gone, What Elysium have ye known, Happy field or mossy cavern,

Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern?

1818. 1820.

FANCY

EVER let the Fancy roam,
Pleasure never is at home :

At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth ;
Then let winged Fancy wander
Through the thought still spread beyond
her:

Open wide the mind's cage-door,
She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar.
O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
Summer's joys are spoilt by use,
And the enjoying of the Spring
Fades as does its blossoming;
Autumn's red-lipp'd fruitage too,
Blushing through the mist and dew,
Cloys with tasting: What do then?
Sit thee by the ingle, when
The sear fagot blazes bright,
Spirit of a winter's night;

When the soundless earth is muffled,
And the caked snow is shuffled
From the ploughboy's heavy shoon;

When the Night doth meet the Noon
In a dark conspiracy

To banish Even from her sky.
Sit thee there, and send abroad,
With a mind self-overaw'd

Fancy, high-commission'd:-send her!
She has vassals to attend her:
She will bring, in spite of frost,
Beauties that the earth hath lost;
She will bring thee, all together,
All delights of summer weather;
All the buds and bells of May,
From dewy sward or thorny spray :
All the heaped Autumn's wealth,
With a still, mysterious stealth:
She will mix these pleasures up
Like three fit wines in a cup,

And thou shalt quaff it:-thou shalt hear

Distant harvest-carols clear;
Rustle of the reaped corn;

Sweet birds antheming the morn:
And, in the same moment-hark!
'Tis the early April lark,

Or the rooks, with busy caw,
Foraging for sticks and straw.
Thou shalt, at one glance, behold
The daisy and the marigold;
White-plum'd lilies, and the first
Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst;
Shaded hyacinth, alway

Sapphire queen of the mid-May;
And every leaf, and every flower
Pearled with the self-same shower.
Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep
Meagre from its celled sleep;
And the snake all winter-thin
Cast on sunny bank its skin;
Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see
Hatching in the hawthorn-tree,
When the henbird's wing doth rest
Quiet on her mossy nest;
Then the hurry and alarm

When the bee-hive casts its swarm;
Acorns ripe down-pattering,
While the autumn breezes sing.

Oh, sweet Fancy! let her loose; Every thing is spoilt by use : Where's the cheek that doth not fade, Too much gaz'd at? Where's the maid Whose lip mature is ever new? Where's the eye, however blue, Doth not weary? Where's the face One would meet in every place? Where's the voice, however soft, One would hear so very oft? At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth Like to bubbles when rain pelteth.

A STORY FROM BOCCACCIO

FAIR Isabel, poor simple Isabel!

Lorenzo, a young palmer in Love's eye!

They could not in the self-same mansion dwell

Without some stir of heart, some malady:

They could not sit at meals but feel how well

It soothed each to be the other by ; They could not, sure, beneath the same roof sleep

But to each other dream, and nightly weep.

With every morn their love grew tenderer,

With every eve deeper and tenderer still;

He might not in house, field, or garden stir,

But her full shape would all his seeing fill:

And his continual voice was pleasanter To her, than noise of trees or hidden rill;

Her lute-string gave an echo of his name, She spoilt her half-done broidery with the same.

He knew whose gentle hand was at the latch,

Before the door had given her to his eyes;

A thousand men in troubles wide and dark:

Half-ignorant, they turn'd an easy wheel,

That set sharp racks at work, to pinch and peel.

Why were they proud? Because their marble founts

Gush'd with more pride than do a wretch's tears?

Why were they proud? Because fair orange-mounts

Were of more soft ascent than lazar stairs?

Why were they proud? Because redlin'd accounts

Were richer than the songs of Grecian years?—

Why were they proud? again we ask aloud,

Why in the name of Glory were they proud?

Yet were these Florentines as self-retired

In hungry pride and gainful cowardice, As two close Hebrews in that land in

Great wits in Spanish, Tuscan, and Malay.

How was it these same ledger-men could spy

Fair Isabella in her downy nest? How could they find out in Lorenzo's eye A straying from his toil? Hot Egypt's pest

Into their vision covetous and sly! How could these money-bags see east and west?

Yet so they did-and every dealer fair Must see behind, as doth the hunted hare.

O eloquent and famed Boccaccio!

Of thee we now should ask forgiving boon,

And of thy spicy myrtles as they blow, And of thy roses amorous of the moon, And of thy lilies, that do paler grow

Now they can no more hear thy ghittern's tune,

)

So on a pleasant morning, as he leant Into the sun-rise, o'er the balustrade Of the garden-terrace, towards him they bent

Their footing through the dews; and to him said,

"You seem there in the quiet of con

tent,

Lorenzo, and we are most loth to invade

Calm speculation; but if you are wise, Bestride your steed while cold is in the

skies.