Wordsworth upon Helvellyn! Let the cloud Ebb audibly along the mountain-wind, Then break against the rock, and show behind The lowland valleys floating up to crowd...
I. Friends of faces unknown and a land Unvisited over the sea, Who tell me how lonely you stand With a single gold curl in the hand Held up to be looked at by me,
A thought ay like a flower upon mine heart, And drew around it other thoughts like bees For multitude and thirst of sweetnesses; Whereat rejoicing, I desired the art...
My future will not copy fair my past On any leaf but Heaven's. Be fully done, Supernal Will! I would not fain be one Who, satisfying thirst and breaking fast Upon the fulness of the heart, at last...
'O dreary life,' we cry, 'O dreary life!' And still the generations of the birds Sing through our sighing, and the flocks and herds Serenely live while we are keeping strife...
I thought once how Theocritus had sung Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years, Who each one in a gracious hand appears To bear a gift for mortals, old or young:...
But only three in all God's universe Have heard this word thou hast said, Himself, beside Thee speaking, and me listening! and replied One of us . . . that was God, . . . and laid the curse...
Unlike are we, unlike, O princely Heart! Unlike our uses and our destinies. Our ministering two angels look surprise On one another, as they strike athwart Their wings in passing. Thou, bethink thee, art...
Thou hast thy calling to some palace-floor, Most gracious singer of high poems! where The dancers will break footing, from the care Of watching up thy pregnant lips for more....
Can it be right to give what I can give? To let thee sit beneath the fall of tears As salt as mine, and hear the sighing years Re-sighing on my lips renunciative...
I lift my heavy heart up solemnly, As once Electra her sepulchral urn, And, looking in thine eyes, I over-turn The ashes at thy feet. Behold and see What a great heap of grief lay hid in me,...
Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore Alone upon the threshold of my door Of individual life, I shall command The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand...
The face of all the world is changed, I think, Since first I heard the footsteps of thy soul Move still, oh, still, beside me, as they stole Betwixt me and the dreadful outer brink...
What can I give thee back, O liberal And princely giver, who hast brought the gold And purple of thine heart, unstained, untold, And laid them on the outside of the wall...
Yet, love, mere love, is beautiful indeed And worthy of acceptation. Fire is bright, Let temple burn, or flax; an equal light Leaps in the flame from cedar-plank or weed:...
And therefore if to love can be desert, I am not all unworthy. Cheeks as pale As these you see, and trembling knees that fail To bear the burden of a heavy heart, This weary minstrel-life that once was girt...
Indeed this very love which is my boast, And which, when rising up from breast to brow, Doth crown me with a ruby large enow To draw men's eyes and prove the inner cost,...
And wilt thou have me fashion into speech The love I bear thee, finding words enough, And hold the torch out, while the winds are rough, Between our faces, to cast light on each?...
If thou must love me, let it be for nought Except for love's sake only. Do not say 'I love her for her smile, her look, her way Of speaking gently, for a trick of thought...