Who died to make pomatum for my love,
Oh could I hope that e’er my favour’d lays
Might curl those lovely locks with conscious pride,
Nor Hammond, nor the Mantuan Shepherds praise
I’d envy then, nor wish reward beside.
Cupid has strung from you, O tresses fine,
The bow that in my breast impell’d his dart 5
From you, sweet locks! he wove the subtle line
Wherewith the urchin angled for my Heart.
Fine are my Delia’s tresses as the threads
That from the silk-worm, self-interr’d, proceed;
Fine as the gleam y Gossamer, that spreads
Its filmy web-work o’er the tangled mead.
Yet with these tresses Cupid’s power elate
My captive heart has handcuffed in a chain,
Strong as the cables of some huge first-rate,
THAT BEARS BRITANNIA’S THUNDERS O’ERTHE MAIN.
The Sylphs that round her radiant locks repair,
In flowing lustre bathe their brightening wings;
And Elfin Minstrels with assiduous care
The ringlets rob for faery fiddle-strings,
ELEGY IV. THE POET RELATES HOW HE STOLE A LOCK OF DELIA’S HAIR, AND HER ANGER.
Oh! be the day accurst that gave me birth!
Ye seas, to swallow me in kindness rise!
Fall on me, mountains! and thou, merciful earth,
Open, and hide me from my Delia’s eyes!
Let universal Chaos now return,
Now let the central fires their prison burst,
And Earth and Heaven and Air and Ocean burn..
For Delia frowns.. she frowns, and I am curst!
Oh! I could dare the fury of the fight,
Where hostile millions sought my single life;
Would storm Volcano batteries with delight,
And grapple with grim Death in glorious strife.
Oh! I could brave the bolts of angry Jove,
When ceaseless lightnings fire the midnight skies;
What is his wrath to that of her I love?
What is his lightning to my Delia’s eyes?
Go, fatal Lock! I cast thee to the wind;
Ye serpent curls, ye poison-tendrils go..
Would I could tear thy memory from my mind.
Accursed Lock,.. thou cause of all my woe!
Seize the curst curls, ye Furies as they fly!
Daemons of darkness, guard the infernal roll,
That thence your cruel vengeance when I die,
May knit the knots of torture for my soul.
Last night,.. Oh hear me Heaven, and grant my prayer!
The Book of Fate before thy suppliant-lay,
And let me from its ample records tear
Only the single page of yesterday!
Or let me meet old Time upon his flight,
And I will stop him on his restless way;
Omnipotent in Love’s resistless might,
I’ll force him lack the road of yesterday.
Last night, as o’er the page of Love’s despair,
My Delia bent deliciously to grieve;
I stood a treacherous loiterer by her chair,
And drew the fatal scissors from my sleeve:
And would that at that instant o’er my thread
The shears of Atropos had open’d then
And when I reft the lock from Delia’s head,
Had cut me sudden from the sons of men!
She heard the scissors that fair lock divide,
And whilst my heart with transport panted big,
She cast a fury frown on me, and cried,
“You stupid puppy,.. you have spoil’d my wig!”
LYRIC POEMS
CONTENTS
TO HORROR.
TO CONTEMPLATION.
TO A FRIEND.
REMEMBRANCE.
THE SOLDIER’S WIFE.
THE WIDOW.
THE CHAPEL BELL.
TO HYMEN.
WRITTEN ON THE FIRST OF DECEMBER.
WRITTEN ON THE FIRST OF JANUARY.
WRITTEN ON SUNDAY MORNING.
THE RACE OF BANQUO.
WRITTEN IN ALENTEJO, JANUARY 23, 1796.
TO RECOVERY.
YOUTH AND AGE.
THE OAK OF OUR FATHERS.
THE BATTLE OF PULTOWA.
THE TRAVELLER’S RETURN.
THE OLD MAN’S COMFORTS AND HOW HE GAINED THEM.
TRANSLATION OF A GREEK ODE ON ASTRONOMY WRITTEN BY S. T. COLERIDGE, FOR THE PRIZE AT CAMBRIDGE, 1793.
GOOSEBERRY-PIE.
TO A BEE.
TO A SPIDER.
THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM
THE DEATH OF WALLACE.
THE SPANISH ARMADA.
ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S DAY.
THE HOLLY-TREE.
THE EBB TIDE.
THE COMPLAINTS OF THE POOR
TO MARY.
TO A FRIEND, INQUIRING IF I WOULD LIVE OVER MY YOUTH AGAIN.
THE DEAD FRIEND.
Southey, 1796
TO HORROR.
Tin gar potaeisomai
tan chai schuliches tromeonti
Erchomenan nechuon ana t’aeria, chai melan aima.
Theocritos
Dark HORROR, hear my call!
Stern Genius hear from thy retreat
On some old sepulchre’s moss-cankered seat,
Beneath the Abbey’s ivied wall
That trembles o’er its shade;
Where wrapt in midnight gloom, alone,
Thou lovest to lie and hear
The roar of waters near,
And listen to the deep dull groan
Of some perturbed sprite
Borne fitful on the heavy gales of night.
Or whether o’er some wide waste hill
Thou mark’st the traveller stray,
Bewilder’d on his lonely way,
When, loud and keen and chill,
The evening winds of winter blow
Drifting deep the dismal snow.
Or if thou followest now on Greenland’s shore,
With all thy terrors, on the lonely way
Of some wrecked mariner, when to the roar
Of herded bears the floating ice-hills round
Pour their deep echoing sound,
And by the dim drear Boreal light
Givest half his dangers to the wretches sight.
Or if thy fury form,
When o’er the midnight deep
The dark-wing’d tempests sweep
Watches from some high cliff the encreasing storm,
Listening with strange delight
As the black billows to the thunder rave
When by the lightnings light
Thou seest the tall ship sink beneath the wave.
Dark HORROR! bear me where the field of fight
Scatters contagion on the tainted gale,
When to the Moon’s faint beam,
On many a carcase shine the dews of night
And a dead silence stills the vale
Save when at times is heard the glutted Raven’s scream.
Where some wreck’d army from the Conquerors might
Speed their disastrous flight,
With thee fierce Genius! let me trace their way,
And hear at times the deep heart-groan
Of some poor sufferer left to die alone,
His sore wounds smarting with the winds of night;
And we will pause, where, on the wild,
The Mother to her frozen breast,
On the heap’d snows reclining clasps her child
And with him sleeps, chill’d to eternal rest!
Black HORROR! speed we to the bed of Death,
Where he whose murderous power afar
Blasts with the myriad plagues of war,
Struggles with his last breath,
Then to his wildly-starting eyes
The phantoms
of the murder’d rise,
Then on his frenzied ear
Their groans for vengeance and the Demon’s yell
In one heart-maddening chorus swell.
Cold on his brow convulsing stands the dew,
And night eternal darkens on his view.
HORROR! I call thee yet once more!
Bear me to that accursed shore
Where round the stake the impaled Negro writhes.
Assume thy sacred terrors then! dispense
The blasting gales of Pestilence!
Arouse the race of Afric! holy Power,
Lead them to vengeance! and in that dread hour
When Ruin rages wide
I will behold and smile by MERCY’S side.
TO CONTEMPLATION.
Kai pagas fileoimi ton enguthen aechon achthein,
A terpei psopheoisa ton agrikon, thchi tarassei.
Moschos.
Faint gleams the evening radiance thro’ the sky,
The sober twilight dimly darkens round;
In short quick circles the shrill bat flits by,
And the slow vapour curls along the ground.
Now the pleas’d eye from yon lone cottage sees
On the green mead the smoke long-shadowing play;
The Red-breast on the blossom’d spray
Warbles wild her latest lay,
And sleeps along the dale the silent breeze.
Calm CONTEMPLATION,’tis thy favorite hour!
Come fill my bosom, tranquillizing Power.
Meek Power! I view thee on the calmy shore
When Ocean stills his waves to rest;
Or when slow-moving on the surge’s hoar
Meet with deep hollow roar
And whiten o’er his breast;
For lo! the Moon with softer radiance gleams,
And lovelier heave the billows in her beams.
When the low gales of evening moan along,
I love with thee to feel the calm cool breeze,
And roam the pathless forest wilds among,
Listening the mellow murmur of the trees
Full-foliaged as they lift their arms on high
And wave their shadowy heads in wildest melody.
Or lead me where amid the tranquil vale
The broken stream flows on in silver light,
And I will linger where the gale
O’er the bank of violets sighs,
Listening to hear its soften’d sounds arise;
And hearken the dull beetle’s drowsy flight,
And watch the horn-eyed snail
Creep o’er his long moon-glittering trail,
And mark where radiant thro’ the night
Moves in the grass-green hedge the glow-worms living light.
Thee meekest Power! I love to meet,
As oft with even solitary pace
The scatter’d Abbeys hallowed rounds I trace
And listen to the echoings of my feet.
Or on the half demolished tomb,
Whole warning texts anticipate my doom:
Mark the clear orb of night
Cast thro’ the storying glass a faintly-varied light.
Nor will I not in some more gloomy hour
Invoke with fearless awe thine holier power,
Wandering beneath the sainted pile
When the blast moans along the darksome aisle,
And clattering patters all around
The midnight shower with dreary sound.
But sweeter ’tis to wander wild
By melancholy dreams beguil’d,
While the summer moon’s pale ray
Faintly guides me on my way
To the lone romantic glen
Far from all the haunts of men,
Where no noise of uproar rude
Breaks the calm of solitude.
But soothing Silence sleeps in all
Save the neighbouring waterfall,
Whose hoarse waters falling near
Load with hollow sounds the ear,
And with down-dasht torrent white
Gleam hoary thro’ the shades of night.
Thus wandering silent on and slow
I’ll nurse Reflection’s sacred woe,
And muse upon the perish’d day
When Hope would weave her visions gay,
Ere FANCY chill’d by adverse fate
Left sad REALITY my mate.
O CONTEMPLATION! when to Memory’s eyes
The visions of the long-past days arise,
Thy holy power imparts the best relief,
And the calm’d Spirit loves the joy of grief.
TO A FRIEND.
Oh my faithful Friend!
Oh early chosen, ever found the same,
And trusted and beloved! once more the verse
Long destined, always obvious to thine ear,
Attend indulgent. — AKENSIDE.
AND wouldst thou seek the low abode
Where Peace delights to dwell?
Pause, Traveller, on thy way of life!
With many a snare and peril rife
Is that long labyrinth of road!
Dark is the vale of years before;
Pause, Traveller, on thy way,
Nor dare the dangerous path explore
Till old Experience comes to lend his leading ray.
Not he who comes with lantern light
Shall guide thy groping pace aright
With faltering feet and slow;
No! let him rear the torch on high,
And every maze shall meet thine eye,
And every snare and every foe;
Then with steady step and strong,
Traveller, shalt thou march along.
Though Power invite thee to her hall,
Regard not thou her tempting call,
Her splendor’s meteor glare;
Though courteous Flattery there await,
And Wealth adorn the dome of State,
There stalks the midnight spectre Care:
Peace, Traveller, doth not sojourn there.
If Fame allure thee, climb not thou
To that steep mountain’s craggy brow
Where stands her stately pile;
For far from thence doth Peace abide,
And thou shalt find Fame’s favoring smile
Cold as the feeble Sun on Hecla’s snow-clad side
And, Traveller! as thou hopest to find
That low and loved abode,
Retire thee from the thronging road,
And shun the mob of human-kind.
Ah! hear how old Experience schools —
“Fly, fly the crowd of Knaves and Fools,
“And thou shalt fly from woe!
“The one thy heedless heart will greet
“With Judas-smile, and thou wilt meet
“In every Fool a Foe!”
So safely mayst thou pass from these,
And reach secure the home of Peace,
And Friendship find thee there;
No happier state can mortal know,
No happier lot can Earth bestow,
If Love thy lot shall share.
Yet still Content with him may dwell
Whom Hymen will not bless,
And Virtue sojourn in the cell
Of hermit Happiness.
Bristol, 1793.
REMEMBRANCE.
MAN HATH a weary pilgrimage
As through the world he wends,
On every stage from youth to age
Still discontent attends;
With heaviness he casts his eye
Upon the road before,
And still remembers with a sigh
The days that are no more.
To school the little exile goes,
Torn from his mother’s arms, —
What then shall soothe his earliest woes,
When novelty hath lost its charms?
Condemn’d to suffer through the day
Restraint
s which no rewards repay,
And cares where love has no concern,
Hope lengthens as she counts the hours
Before his wish’d return.
From hard control and tyrant rules,
The unfeeling discipline of schools,
In thought he loves to roam,
And tears will struggle in his eye
While he remembers with a sigh
The comforts of his home.
Youth conies; the toils and cares of life
Torment the restless mind;
Where shall the tired and harass’d heart
Its consolation find:
Then is not Youth, as Fancy tells,
Life’s summer prime of joy?
All no! for hopes too long delay’d
And feelings blasted or betray’d,
Its fabled bliss destroy;
And Youth remembers with a sigh
The careless days of Infancy.
Maturer Manhood now arrives,
And other thoughts come on,
But with the baseless hopes of Youth
Its generous warmth is gone;
Cold, calculating cares succeed,
The timid thought, the wary deed,
The dull realities of truth;
Back on the past he turns his eye,
Remembering with an envious sigh
The happy dreams of Youth.
So reaches he the latter stage
Of this our mortal pilgimage,
With feeble step and slow;
New ills that latter stage await,
And old Experience learns too late
That all is vanity below.
Life’s vain delusions are gone by;
Its idle hopes are o’er;
Yet Age remembers with a sigh
The days that are no more.
Westbury, 1798.
THE SOLDIER’S WIFE.
DACTYLICS.
WEARY way-wanderer, languid and sick at heart,
Complete Poetical Works of Robert Southey Page 32