"Porphyro will leave me here to fade and

pine.—

"Cruel! what traitor could thee hither bring? "I curse not, for my heart is lost in thine,

"Though thou forsakest a deceived thing;"A dove forlorn and lost with sick unpruned wing."

XXXVIII.

"My Madeline! sweet dreamer! lovely bride! "Say, may I be for aye thy vassal blest?

"Thy beauty's shield, heart-shap'd and vermeil dy'd?

66

Ah, silver shrine, here will I take my rest "After so many hours of toil and quest, "A famish'd pilgrim,-sav'd by miracle. “Though I have found, I will not rob thy nest "Saving of thy sweet self; if thou think'st well "To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude infidel.

XXXIX.

"Hark! 'tis an elfin-storm from faery land, "Of haggard seeming, but a boon indeed: "Arise-arise! the morning is at hand;— "The bloated wassailers will never heed:"Let us away, my love, with happy speed; "There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see,"Drown'd all in Rhenish and the sleepy mead: "Awake! arise! my love, and fearless be,

"For o'er the southern moors I have a home for thee."

XL.

She hurried at his words, beset with fears,
For there were sleeping dragons all around,
At glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears-
Down the wide stairs a darkling way they
found.-

In all the house was heard no human sound. A chain-droop'd lamp was flickering by each door;

The arras rich with horseman, hawk, and hound,

Flutter'd in the besieging wind's uproar;

And the long carpets rose along the gusty floor.

XLI.

They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall;
Like phantoms, tɔ the iron porch, they glide;
Where lay the Porter, in uneasy sprawl,
With a huge empty flagon by his side:

The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide,

But his sagacious eye an inmate owns:

By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide:The chains lie silent on the footworn stones;The key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans.

XLII.

And they are gone: ay, ages long ago
These lovers fled away into the storm.

That night the Baron dreamt of many a woe, And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form

Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm, Were long be-nightmar'd. Angela the old Died palsy-twitch'd, with meagre face deform; The Beadsman, after thousand aves told, For aye unsought-for slept amongst his ashes cold.

ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE

(1819)

I.

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains
One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
But being too happy in thine happiness,-
That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees,
In some melodious plot

Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,
Singest of summer in full-throated ease.

II.

O, for a draught of vintage! that hath been
Cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth,
Tasting of Flora and the country green,
Dance, and Provençal song, and sunburnt
mirth!

O for a beaker full of the warm South,
Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,
With beaded bubbles winking at the brim,
And purple-stained mouth;

That I might drink, and leave the world unseen,
And with thee fade away into the forest dim:

III.

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget

What thou among the leaves hast never known, The weariness, the fever, and the fret

Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;

Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;

Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
And leaden-ey'd despairs,

Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,
Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow.
IV.

Away! away! for I will fly to thee,

Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards, But on the viewless wings of Poesy,

Though the dull brain perplexes and retards: Already with thee! tender is the night,

And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne, Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays; But here there is no light,

Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy

ways.

V.

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,
Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs,
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet
Wherewith the seasonable month endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild;
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine;
Fast fading violets cover'd up in leaves;
And mid-May's eldest child,

The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,
The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves.

VI.

Darkling I listen; and, for many a time

I have been half in love with easeful Death, Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme, To take into the air my quiet breath;

Now more than ever seems it rich to die, To cease upon the midnight with no pain, While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad In such an ecstasy!

Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain— To thy high requiem become a sod.

VII.

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!
No hungry generations tread thee down;
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown:
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for
home,

She stood in tears amid the alien corn;
The same that oft-times hath

Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam
Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.

VIII.

Forlorn! the very word is like a bell

To toll me back from thee to my sole self! Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well As she is fam'd to do, deceiving elf. Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades Past the near meadows, over the still stream, Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep In the next valley-glades:

Was it a vision, or a waking dream?

Fled is that music:-Do I wake or sleep?