by Homer
In the midst a form divine! 115
Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-Line:
Her lion-port, her awe-commanding face
Attemper’d sweet to virgin-grace.
What strings symphonious tremble in the air,
What strains of vocal transport round her play? 120
Hear from the grave, great Taliessin, hear;
They breathe a soul to animate thy clay.
Bright Rapture calls, and soaring as she sings,
Waves in the eye of Heaven her many-coloured wings.
‘The verse adorn again 125
Fierce War, and faithful Love,
And Truth severe, by fairy Fiction drest.
In buskin’d measures move
Pale Grief, and pleasing Pain,
With Horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast. 130
A voice as of the cherub-choir
Gales from blooming Eden bear,
And distant warblings lessen on my ear
That lost in long futurity expire.
Fond impious man, think’st thou yon sanguine cloud 135
Raised by thy breath, has quench’d the orb of day?
To-morrow he repairs the golden flood
And warms the nations with redoubled ray.
Enough for me: with joy I see
The different doom our fates assign: 140
Be thine Despair and sceptred Care,
To triumph and to die are mine.’
— He spoke, and headlong from the mountain’s height
Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Ode on the Pleasure Arising from Vicissitude
Thomas Gray (1716–1771)
NOW the golden Morn aloft
Waves her dew-bespangled wing,
With vermeil cheek and whisper soft
She woos the tardy Spring:
Till April starts, and calls around 5
The sleeping fragrance from the ground,
And lightly o’er the living scene
Scatters his freshest, tenderest green.
New-born flocks, in rustic dance,
Frisking ply their feeble feet; 10
Forgetful of their wintry trance
The birds his presence greet:
But chief, the sky-lark warbles high
His trembling thrilling ecstasy;
And lessening from the dazzled sight, 15
Melts into air and liquid light.
Yesterday the sullen year
Saw the snowy whirlwind fly;
Mute was the music of the air,
The herd stood drooping by; 20
Their raptures now that wildly flow
No yesterday nor morrow know;
’Tis Man alone that joy descries
With forward and reverted eyes.
Smiles on past Misfortune’s brow 25
Soft Reflection’s hand can trace,
And o’er the cheek of Sorrow throw
A melancholy grace;
While Hope prolongs our happier hour,
Or deepest shades, that dimly lour 30
And blacken round our weary way,
Gilds with a gleam of distant day.
Still, where rosy Pleasure leads,
See a kindred Grief pursue;
Behind the steps that Misery treads 35
Approaching Comfort view:
The hues of bliss more brightly glow
Chastised by sabler tints of woe,
And blended form, with artful strife,
The strength and harmony of life. 40
See the wretch that long has tost
On the thorny bed of pain,
At length repair his vigour lost
And breathe and walk again:
The meanest floweret of the vale, 45
The simplest note that swells the gale,
The common sun, the air, the skies,
To him are opening Paradise.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
On a Favourite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes
Thomas Gray (1716–1771)
‘TWAS on a lofty vase’s side,
Where China’s gayest art had dyed
The azure flowers that blow,
Demurest of the tabby kind
The pensive Selima, reclined, 5
Gazed on the lake below.
Her conscious tail her joy declared:
The fair round face, the snowy beard,
The velvet of her paws,
Her coat that with the tortoise vies, 10
Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes —
She saw, and purr’d applause.
Still had she gazed, but ‘midst the tide
Two angel forms were seen to glide,
The Genii of the stream: 15
Their scaly armour’s Tyrian hue
Through richest purple, to the view
Betray’d a golden gleam.
The hapless Nymph with wonder saw:
A whisker first, and then a claw 20
With many an ardent wish
She stretch’d, in vain, to reach the prize —
What female heart can gold despise?
What Cat’s averse to fish?
Presumptuous maid! with looks intent 25
Again she stretch’d, again she bent,
Nor knew the gulf between —
Malignant Fate sat by and smiled —
The slippery verge her feet beguiled;
She tumbled headlong in! 30
Eight times emerging from the flood
She mew’d to every watery God
Some speedy aid to send: —
No Dolphin came, no Nereid stirr’d.
Nor cruel Tom nor Susan heard — 35
A favourite has no friend!
From hence, ye Beauties! undeceived
Know one false step is ne’er retrieved,
And be with caution bold:
Not all that tempts your wandering eyes 40
And heedless hearts, is lawful prize,
Nor all that glisters, gold!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
George Bubb Dodington, Lord Melcombe
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Shorten Sail
George Bubb Dodington, Lord Melcombe (1691–1762)
LOVE thy country, wish it well,
Not with too intense a care;
’Tis enough that, when it fell,
Thou its ruin didst not share.
Envy’s censure, Flattery’s praise, 5
With unmoved indifference view:
Learn to tread Life’s dangerous maze
With unerring Virtue’s clue.
Void of strong desire and fear,
Life’s wide ocean trust no more; 10
Strive thy little bark to steer
With the tide, but near the shore.
Thus prepared, thy shorten’d sail
Shall, when’er the winds increase,
Seizing each propitious gale, 15
Waft thee to the port of Peace.
Keep thy conscience from offence
And tempestuous passions free,
So, when thou art call’d from hence,
Easy shall thy passage be. 20
— Easy shall thy passage be,
Cheerful thy allotted stay,
Short the account ‘twixt God and thee.
Hope shall meet thee on thy way.
English Poetry II: From Collins to Fitzgerald.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
William Collins
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical
Order
Fidele
William Collins (1720–1759)
TO fair Fidele’s grassy tomb
Soft maids and village hinds shall bring
Each opening sweet of earliest bloom,
And rifle all the breathing Spring.
No wailing ghost shall dare appear 5
To vex with shrieks this quiet grove;
But shepherds lads assemble here,
And melting virgins own their love.
No wither’d witch shall here be seen,
No goblins lead their nightly crew; 10
The female fays shall haunt the green,
And dress thy grave with pearly dew.
The redbreast oft at evening hours
Shall kindly lend his little aid,
With hoary moss, and gather’d flowers, 15
To deck the ground where thou art laid.
When howling winds, and beating rain,
In tempests shake thy sylvan cell;
Or ‘midst the chase, on every plain,
The tender thought on thee shall dwell; 20
Each lonely scene shall thee restore,
For thee the tear be duly shed;
Beloved, till life can charm no more;
And mourn’d, till Pity’s self be dead.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Ode Written in MDCCXLVI
William Collins (1720–1759)
HOW sleep the Brave, who sink to rest
By all their Country’s wishes blest!
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallow’d mould,
She there shall dress a sweeter sod 5
Than Fancy’s feet have ever trod.
By fairy hands their knell is rung,
By forms unseen their dirge is sung:
There Honour comes, a pilgrim gray,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay; 10
And Freedom shall awhile repair
To dwell, a weeping hermit, there!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The Passions
An Ode for Music
William Collins (1720–1759)
WHEN Music, heavenly maid, was young,
While yet in early Greece she sung,
The Passions oft, to hear her shell,
Throng’d around her magic cell
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting, 5
Possest beyond the Muse’s painting,
By turns they felt the glowing mind
Disturb’d, delighted, raised, refined:
‘Till once, ’tis said, when all were fired,
Fill’d with fury, rapt, inspired, 10
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatch’d her instruments of sound,
And, as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forceful art,
Each, for Madness ruled the hour, 15
Would prove his own expressive power.
First Fear his hand, its skill to try,
Amid the chords bewilder’d laid,
And back recoil’d, he knew not why,
E’en at the sound himself had made. 20
Next Anger rush’d, his eyes on fire,
In lightnings own’d his secret stings;
In one rude clash he struck the lyre
And swept with hurried hand the strings.
With woeful measures wan Despair, 25
Low sullen sounds, his grief beguiled;
A solemn, strange, and mingled air,
’Twas sad by fits, by starts ’twas wild.
But thou, O Hope, with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure? 30
Still it whisper’d promised pleasure
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail!
Still would her touch the strain prolong:
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale
She call’d on Echo still through all the song; 35
And, where her sweetest theme she chose,
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close;
And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden hair; —
And longer had she sung: — but with a frown
Revenge impatient rose: 40
He threw his blood-stain’d sword in thunder down;
And with a withering look
The war-denouncing trumpet took
And blew a blast so loud and dread,
Were ne’er prophetic sounds so full of woe! 45
And ever and anon he beat
The doubling drum with furious heat;
And, though sometimes, each dreary pause between,
Dejected Pity at his side
Her soul-subduing voice applied, 50
Yet still he kept his wild unalter’d mien,
While each strain’d ball of sight seem’d bursting from his head.
Thy numbers, Jealousy, to nought were fix’d:
Sad proof of thy distressful state!
Of differing themes the veering song was mix’d; 55
And now it courted Love, now raving call’d on Hate.
With eyes up-raised, as one inspired,
Pale Melancholy sat retired;
And from her wild sequester’d seat,
In notes by distance made more sweet, 60
Pour’d through the mellow horn her pensive soul:
And dashing soft from rocks around
Bubbling runnels join’d the sound;
Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole,
Or, o’er some haunted stream, with fond delay, 65
Round an holy calm diffusing,
Love of peace, and lonely musing,
In hollow murmurs died away.
But O! how alter’d was its sprightlier tone
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue, 70
Her bow across her shoulder flung,
Her buskins gemm’d with morning dew,
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung,
The hunter’s call to Faun and Dryad known!
The oak-crown’d Sisters and their chaste-eyed Queen, 75
Satyrs and Sylvan Boys, were seen
Peeping from forth their alleys green:
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear;
And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen spear.
Last came Joy’s ecstatic trial: 80
He, with viny crown advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand addrest:
But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol
Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best:
They would have thought who heard the strain 85
They saw, in Tempe’s vale, her native maids
Amidst the festal-sounding shades
To some unwearied minstrel dancing;
While, as his flying fingers kiss’d the strings,
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round: 90
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound;
And he, amidst his frolic play,
As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings.
O Music! sphere-descended maid, 95
Friend of Pleasure, Wisdom’s aid!
Why, goddess, why, to us denied,
Lay’st thou thy ancient lyre aside?
As in that loved Athenian bower
You learn’d an all-commanding power, 100
Thy mimic soul, O nymph endear’d!
Can well recall what then it heard.
Where is thy native simple heart
Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art?
Arise, as in that elder time, 105
Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime!
Thy wonders, in that god-like age,
Fill thy recording Sister’s page; —
’Tis said, and I believe the tale,
Thy humblest reed could more prevail 110
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age,
E’en all at once together found
Cecilia’s mingled world of sound: —
O bid our vain endeavours cease: 115
Revive the just designs of Greece:
Return in all thy simple state!
Confirm the tales her sons relate!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
To Evening
William Collins (1720–1759)
IF aught of oaten stop or pastoral song
May hope, chaste Eve, to soothe thy modest ear
Like thy own solemn springs,
Thy springs and dying gales;
O Nymph reserved, — while now the bright-hair’d sun 5
Sits in yon western tent, whose cloudy skirts,
With brede ethereal wove,
O’erhang his wavy bed,
Now air is hush’d, save where the weak-eyed bat
With short shrill shriek flits by on leathern wing, 10
Or where the beetle winds
His small but sullen horn,
As oft he rises midst the twilight path,
Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum, —
Now teach me, maid composed, 15
To breathe some soften’d strain.
Whose numbers, stealing through thy darkening vale,
May not unseemly with its stillness suit;
As, musing slow, I hail
Thy genial loved return. 20
For when thy folding-star arising shows
His paly circlet, at his warning-lamp
The fragrant Hours, and Elves
Who slept in buds the day,