Like a glow-worm golden In a dell of dew, Scattering unbeholden Its aerial hue Among the flowers and grass which screen it from the view: Like a rose embower'd In its own green leaves, By warm winds deflower'd, Till the scent it gives Makes faint with too much sweet those heavy-winged thieves. Sound of vernal showers On the twinkling grass, Rain-awaken'd flowers-- All that ever was Joyous and clear and fresh--thy music doth surpass. Teach us, sprite or bird, What sweet thoughts are thine: I have never heard Praise of love or wine That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine. Chorus hymeneal, Or triumphal chant, Match'd with thine would be all But an empty vaunt-- A thin wherein we feel there is some hidden want. What objects are the fountains Of thy happy strain? What fields, or waves, or mountains? What shapes of sky or plain? What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain? With thy clear keen joyance Languor cannot be: Shadow of annoyance Never came near thee: Thou lovest, but ne'er knew love's sad satiety. Waking or asleep, Thou of death must deem Things more true and deep Than we mortals dream, Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream? We look before and after, And pine for what is not: Our sincerest laughter With some pain is fraught; Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought. Yet, if we could scorn Hate and pride and fear, If we were things born Not to shed a tear, I know not how thy joy we ever should come near. Better than all measures Of delightful sound, Better than all treasures That in books are found, Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground! Teach me half the gladness That thy brain must know; Such harmonious madness From my lips would flow, The world should listen then, as I am listening now. Percy Bysshe Shelley. 1792-1822 609. The Moon I AND, like a dying lady lean and pale, Who totters forth, wrapp'd in a gauzy veil, Out of her chamber, led by the insane And feeble wanderings of her fading brain, The mood arose up in the murky east, A white and shapeless mass. II Art thou pale for weariness Of climbing heaven and gazing on the earth, Wandering companionless Among the stars that have a different birth, And ever changing, like a joyless eye That finds no object worth its constancy? Percy Bysshe Shelley. 1792-1822 610. Ode to the West Wind I O WILD West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being Thou from whose unseen presence the leaves dead Are driven like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing, Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, Pestilence-stricken multitudes! O thou Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed