Snapping his lucid fingers merrily !— Ah, Zephyrus! art here, and Flora too! Ye tender bibbers of the rain and dew, Young playmates of the rose and daffodil, Be careful, ere ye enter in, to fill Your baskets high With fennel green, and balm, and golden pines, Savory, latter-mint, and columbines, Cool parsley, basil sweet, and sunny thyme; Yea, every flower and leaf of every clime, All gather'd in the dewy morning: hie Away! fly, fly! Crystalline brother of the belt of heaven, Aquarius! to whom king Jove has given Two liquid pulse streams 'stead of feather'd wings, Two fan-like fountains,-thine illuminings For Dian play: Dissolve the frozen purity of air; Let thy white shoulders silvery and bare Shew cold through watery pinions; make more bright The Star-Queen's crescent on her marriage night: Haste, haste away! Castor has tamed the planet Lion, see! Speeding away swift as the eagle bird? The Lion's maue's on end: the Bear how fierce! The Centaur's arrow ready seems to pierce Some enemy: far forth his bow is bent Into the blue of heaven. He'll be shent, Pale unrelentor, When he shall hear the wedding lutes aplaying.- Andromeda sweet woman! why delaying So timidly among the stars: come hither! Join this bright throng, and nimbly fol low whither They all are going. Danae's Son, before Jove newly bow'd, Has wept for thee, calling to Jove aloud. Thee, gentle lady, did he disenthral: Ye shall for ever live and love, for all Thy tears are flowing. 1817. 1818. ROBIN HOOD No! those days are gone away, No, the bugle sounds no more, And the twanging how no more; Silent is the ivory shrill Past the heath and up the hill; There is no mid-forest laugh, Where lone Echo gives the half To some wight, amaz'd to hear Jesting, deep in forest drear. On the fairest time of June You may go, with sun or moon, Or the seven stars to light you, Or the polar ray to right you; But you never may behold Little John, or Robin bold; Never one, of all the clan, Thrumming on an empty can Some old hunting ditty, while He doth his green way beguile To fair hostess Merriment, Down beside the pasture Trent; For he left the merry tale Messenger for spicy ale. Gone, the merry morris din ; Gone, the song of Gamelyn; Gone, the tough-belted outlaw Idling in the "grere shawe; All are gone away and past! And if Robin should be cast Sudden from his turfed grave, And if Marian should have Once again her forest days, She would weep, and he would craze : He would swear, for all his oaks, Fall'n beneath the dockyard strokes, Have rotted on the briny seas; She would weep that her wild bees Sang not to her-strange! that honey Can't be got without hard money! So it is: yet let us sing, Honor to the old bow-string! Honor to the bugle-horn! Honor to the woods unshorn! Honor to the Lincoln green! LINES ON THE MERMAID TAVERN SOULS of Poets dead and gone, I have heard that on a day And pledging with contented smack Souls of Poets dead and gone, What Elysium have ye known, Happy field or mossy cavern, Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern? 1818. 1820. FANCY EVER let the Fancy roam, At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth, Open wide the mind's cage-door, When the soundless earth is muffled, When the Night doth meet the Noon To banish Even from her sky. Fancy, high-commission'd:-send her! And thou shalt quaff it:-thou shalt hear Distant harvest-carols clear; Sweet birds antheming the morn : Or the rooks, with busy caw, Sapphire queen of the mid-May; When the bee-hive casts its swarm; Oh, sweet Fancy! let her loose; Every thing is spoilt by use: Where's the cheek that doth not fade, Too much gaz'd at? Where's the maid Whose lip mature is ever new? Where's the eye, however blue, Doth not weary? Where's the face One would meet in every place? Where's the voice, however soft, One would hear so very oft? At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth Like to bubbles when rain pelteth. |