Nor only in fair places do I see The picture fair now it has ceased to be: For fate once led me, and myself some days Did I devote, to dull laborious ways, By soaring thought detained to tread full low,-- Yea might I say unbeauteous paths of woe And dreary abodes, had not my youthful sprite Hallow'd each nook with legends of delight. Ah! o'er that smoky town who looketh now By winter sunset from the dark hill-brow, Under the dying trees exultantly Nursing the sting of human tragedy? Or in that little room upstair'd so high, Where London's roofs in thickest huddle lie, Who now returns at evening to entice To his fireside the joys of Paradise? Once sacred was that hearth, and bright the air; The flame of man's redemption flickered there, In worship of those spirits, whose deathless fames Have thrilled the stars of heaven to hear their names; They that excell'd in wisdom to create Beauty, with mortal passion conquering fate; And, mid the sovran powers of elder time, The loveliness of music and new rhyme, The masters young that first enthrallèd me; Of whom if I should name, whom then but thee, Sweet Shelley, or the boy whose book was found Thrust in thy bosom on thy body drowned? O mighty Muse, wooer of virgin thought, Beside thy charm all else counteth as nought; The revelation of thy smile doth make Him whom thou lovest reckless for thy sake; Earthborn of suffering, that knowest well To call thine own, and with enamouring spell Feedest the stolen powers of godlike youth On dear imagination's only truth, Building with song a temple of desire; And with the yearning music of thy quire, In nuptial sacrament of thought and sense Hallowest for toil the hours of indolence: Thou in thy melancholic beauty drest, Subduest ill to serve thy fair behest, With tragic tears, and sevenfold purified Silver of mirth; and with extremest pride, With secret doctrine and unfathomed lore Remainest yet a child for evermore, The only enchantress of the earth that art To cheer his day and staunch man's bleeding heart.