by Homer
I travell’d among unknown men
In lands beyond the sea;
Nor, England! did I know till then
What love I bore to thee.
’Tis past, that melancholy dream! 45
Nor will I quit thy shore
A second time, for still I seem
To love thee more and more.
Among thy mountains did I feel
The joy of my desire; 50
And she I cherish’d turn’d her wheel
Beside an English fire.
Thy mornings show’d, thy nights conceal’d
The bowers where Lucy play’d;
And thine too is the last green field 55
That Lucy’s eyes survey’d.
IV
Three years she grew in sun and shower;
Then Nature said, ‘A lovelier flower
On earth was never sown:
This child I to myself will take; 60
She shall be mine, and I will make
A lady of my own.
‘Myself will to my darling be
Both law and impulse: and with me
The girl, in rock and plain, 65
In earth and heaven, in glade and bower,
Shall feel an overseeing power
To kindle or restrain.
‘She shall be sportive as the fawn
That wild with glee across the lawn 70
Or up the mountain springs;
And her’s shall be the breathing balm,
And her’s the silence and the calm
Of mute insensate things.
‘The floating clouds their state shall lend 75
To her; for her the willow bend;
Nor shall she fail to see
E’en in the motions of the storm
Grace that shall mould the maiden’s form
By silent sympathy. 80
‘The stars of midnight shall be dear
To her; and she shall lean her ear
In many a secret place
Where rivulets dance their wayward round,
And beauty born of murmuring sound 85
Shall pass into her face.
‘And vital feelings of delight
Shall rear her form to stately height,
Her virgin bosom swell;
Such thoughts to Lucy I will give 90
Where she and I together live
Here in this happy dell.’
Thus Nature spake — The work was done —
How soon my Lucy’s race was run!
She died, and left to me 95
This heath, this calm and quiet scene;
The memory of what has been,
And never more will be.
V
A slumber did my spirit seal;
I had no human fears: 100
She seem’d a thing that could not feel
The touch of earthly years.
No motion has she now, no force;
She neither hears nor sees;
Roll’d round in earth’s diurnal course 105
With rocks, and stones, and trees.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The Inner Vision
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
MOST sweet it is with unuplifted eyes
To pace the ground, if path there be or none
While a fair region round the Traveller lies
Which he forbears again to look upon;
Pleased rather with some soft ideal scene 5
The work of Fancy, or some happy tone
Of meditation, slipping in between
The beauty coming and the beauty gone.
— If Thought and Love desert us, from that day
Let us break off all commerce with the Muse: 10
With Thought and Love companions of our way —
Whate’er the senses take or may refuse, —
The Mind’s internal heaven shall shed her dews
Of inspiration on the humblest lay.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
By the Sea
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
IT is a beauteous evening, calm and free;
The holy time is quiet as a nun
Breathless with adoration; the broad sun
Is sinking down in its tranquillity;
The gentleness of heaven is on the Sea: 5
Listen! the mighty being is awake,
And doth with his eternal motion make
A sound like thunder — everlastingly.
Dear child! dear girl! that walkest with me here,
If thou appear untouch’d by solemn thought 10
Thy nature is not therefore less divine:
Thou liest in Abraham’s bosom all the year,
And worship’st at the Temple’s inner shrine,
God being with thee when we know it not.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Upon Westminster Bridge
Sept. 3, 1802
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
EARTH has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth like a garment wear
The beauty of the morning: silent, bare, 5
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour valley, rock, or hill; 10
Ne’er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
To a Distant Friend
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
WHY art thou silent? Is thy love a plant
Of such weak fibre that the treacherous air
Of absence withers what was once so fair?
Is there no debt to pay, no boon to grant?
Yet have my thoughts for thee been vigilant, 5
Bound to thy service with unceasing care —
The mind’s least generous wish a mendicant
For nought but what thy happiness could spare.
Speak! — though this soft warm heart, once free to hold
A thousand tender pleasures, thine and mine, 10
Be left more desolate, more dreary cold
Than a forsaken bird’s-nest fill’d with snow
‘Mid its own bush of leafless eglantine —
Speak, that my torturing doubts their end may know!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Desideria
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
SURPRIZED by joy — impatient as the wind —
I turn’d to share the transport — O with whom
But Thee — deep buried in the silent tomb,
That spot which no vicissitude can find?
Love, faithful love recall’d thee to my mind 5
But how could I forget thee? Through what power
Even for the least division of an hour
Have I been so beguiled as to be blind
To my most grievous loss — That thought’s return
Was the worst pang that sorrow ever bore, 10
Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn,
Knowing my heart’s best treasure was no more;
That neither present time, nor years unborn
Could to my sight that heavenly face restore.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
We Must Be Free or Die
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
IT is not to be thought of that the flood
Of British freedom, which, to the open sea
Of the world’s praise, from dark antiquity
Hath flowed, ‘with pomp of waters, unwithstood,’
Roused though it be full often to a mood 5
Which spurns the check of salutary bands,
That this most famous Stream in bogs and sands
Should perish; and to evil and to good
Be lost for ever. In our halls is hung
Armoury of the invincible knights of old: 10
We must be free or die, who speak the tongue
That Shakespeare spoke: the faith and morals hold
Which Milton held. — In everything we are sprung
Of Earth’s first blood, have titles manifold.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
England and Switzerland
[1802]
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
TWO voices are there, one is of the Sea,
One of the Mountains, each a mighty voice:
In both from age to age thou didst rejoice,
They were thy chosen music, Liberty!
There came a tyrant, and with holy glee 5
Thou fought’st against him, — but hast vainly striven:
Thou from thy Alpine holds at length art driven
Where not a torrent murmurs heard by thee.
— Of one deep bliss thine ear hath been bereft;
Then cleave, O cleave to that which still is left — 10
For high-soul’d Maid, what sorrow would it be
That Mountain floods should thunder as before,
And Ocean bellow from his rocky shore,
And neither awful Voice be heard by Thee!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
On the Extinction of the Venetian Republic
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
ONCE did She hold the gorgeous East in fee
And was the safeguard of the West; the worth
Of Venice did not fall below her birth,
Venice, the eldest child of liberty.
She was a maiden city, bright and free; 5
No guile seduced, no force could violate;
And when she took unto herself a mate,
She must espouse the everlasting Sea.
And what if she had seen those glories fade,
Those titles vanish, and that strength decay, — 10
Yet shall some tribute of regret be paid
When her long life hath reach’d its final day:
Men are we, and must grieve when even the shade
Of that which once was great has pass’d away.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
London, MDCCCII
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
O FRIEND! I know not which way I must look
For comfort, being, as I am, opprest
To think that now our life is only drest
For show; mean handi-work of craftsman, cook,
Or groom! — We must run glittering like a brook 5
In the open sunshine, or we are unblest;
The wealthiest man among us is the best:
No grandeur now in nature or in book
Delights us. Rapine, avarice, expense,
This is idolatry; and these we adore: 10
Plain living and high thinking are no more:
The homely beauty of the good old cause
Is gone; our peace, our fearful innocence,
And pure religion breathing household laws.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The Same
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
MILTON! thou shouldst be living at this hour:
England hath need of thee: she is a fen
Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen,
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower,
Have forfeited their ancient English dower 5
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men:
O! raise us up, return to us again;
And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power.
Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart:
Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea, 10
Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free;
So didst thou travel on life’s common way
In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart
The lowliest duties on herself did lay.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
When I Have Borne
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
WHEN I have borne in memory what has tamed
Great nations; how ennobling thoughts depart
When men change swords for ledgers, and desert
The student’s bower for gold, — some fears unnamed
I had, my Country! — am I to be blamed? 5
Now, when I think of thee, and what thou art,
Verily, in the bottom of my heart
Of those unfilial fears I am ashamed.
For dearly must we prize thee; we who find
In thee a bulwark for the cause of men; 10
And I by my affection was beguiled:
What wonder if a Poet now and then,
Among the many movements of his mind,
Felt for thee as a lover or a child!
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
The World is Too Much With Us
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
THE WORLD is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon, 5
The winds that will be howling at all hours
And are up-gather’d now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for every thing, we are out of tune;
It moves us not. — Great God! I’d rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn, — 10
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathéd horn.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Within King’s College Chapel, Cambridge
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
TAX not the royal Saint with vain expense,
With ill-match’d aims the Architect who plann’d
(Albeit labouring for a scanty band
Of white-robed Scholars only) this immense
And glorious work of fine intelligence! 5
— Give all thou canst; high Heaven rejects the lore
Of nicely-calculated less or more: —
So deem’d the man who fashion’d for the sense
These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof
Self-poised, and scoop’d into ten thousand cells 10
Where light and shade repose, where music dwells
Lingering and wandering on as loth to die —
Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof
That they were born for immortality.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Valedictory Sonnet to the River Duddon
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
I THOUGHT of Thee, my partner and my guide,
As being past away. — Vain sympathies!
For, backward, Dud
don! as I cast my eyes,
I see what was, and is, and will abide;
Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide; 5
The Form remains, the Function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,
We Men, who in our morn of youth defied
The elements, must vanish; — be it so!
Enough, if something from our hands have power 10
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;
And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,
Through love, through hope, and faith’s transcendent dower,
We feel that we are greater than we know.
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order
List of Poets in Alphabetical Order
Composed at Neidpath Castle, the Property of Lord Queensberry
[1803]
William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
DEGENERATE Douglas! oh, the unworthy lord!