Works

I have no secrets from thee, lyre sublime,
My lyre whereof I make my melody.
I sing one way like the west wind through thee,
With my whole heart, and hear thy sweet strings chime.
...

Drawn at Eartham in the 61st year of my age, and in the months of August and September 1792.


Romney, expert infallibly to trace
On chart or canvas, not the form alone...

Who looked for thee, thou little song of mine?
This winter of a silent poet's heart
Is suddenly sweet with thee, but what thou art,
Mid-winter flower, I would I could divine.
...

Who looked for thee, thou little song of mine?
This winter of a silent poet's heart
Is suddenly sweet with thee, but what thou art,
Mid-winter flower, I would I could divine.
...

Come long-lost blessing! heaven-lov'd seraph, haste,
On pity's wings upborne, a world's wide woes
Invoke thy smiles extatic, long effac'd,
Beneath the tear which all corrosive flows;...

To be the father of the fatherless,
To stretch the hand from the throne's height, and raise
His offspring, who expired in other days
To make thy Sire's sway by a kingdom less, - [ih]...

In this chill morning of a wintry Spring
I look into the gloom'd and rainy vale;
The sullen clouds, the stormy winds assail,
Lour on the fields, and with impetuous wing...

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,...

While with false pride, and narrow jealousy,
Numbers reject each new expression, won,
Perchance, from language richer than our own,
O! with glad welcome may the POET see...

With lyre Orphean, see a Bard explore
The central caverns of the mornless Night,
Where never Muse perform'd harmonious rite
Till now! - and lo! upon the sparry floor,...

To one who has been long in city pent,
'Tis very sweet to look into the fair
And open face of heaven to breathe a prayer
Full in the smile of the blue firmament....

Ah! might I range each hallow'd bower and glade
Mus'us cultur'd, many a raptur'd sigh
Wou'd that dear, local consciousness supply
Beneath his willow, in the grotto's shade,...

Fortunate Vale! exulting Hill! dear Plain!
Where morn, and eve, my soul's fair Idol stray'd,
While all your winds, that murmur'd thro' the glade,
Stole her sweet breath; yet, yet your paths retain...

Behold him now his genuine colours wear,
That specious False-One, by whose cruel wiles
I lost thy amity; saw thy dear smiles
Eclips'd; those smiles, that us'd my heart to cheer,...

Soo-Ti, I thank the careful fate
That made you wise and obstinate,
Alert, but with a proper pride,
And gay, but wondrous dignified.
I praise your black and tilted nose;...

So proud she was to die
It made us all ashamed
That what we cherished, so unknown
To her desire seemed.

So satisfied to go
Where none of us should be,
Immediately, that anguish stooped...

To the Editor of the Knickerbocker.
...

Time, hurry my Love to me:
Haste, haste! Lov'st not good company?
Here's but a heart-break sandy waste
'Twixt Now and Then. Why, killing haste
Were best, dear Time, for thee, for thee!
...

Lo! I must tell a tale of chivalry;
For large white plumes are dancing in mine eye.
Not like the formal crest of latter days:
But bending in a thousand graceful ways;...

I pray you, all ye men who put your trust
In moulds and systems and well-tackled gear,
Holding that Nature lives from year to year
In one continual round because she must--...