The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth — Volume 6 (of 8)Wordsworth, William
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The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth — Volume 6 (of 8)
Wordsworth, William
English poetry -- 18th century; English poetry -- 19th century
And is She brought within the power 110
Of vision?--o'er this tempting flower
Hovering until the petals stay
Her flight, and take its voice away!--
Observe[247] each wing!--a tiny van!
The structure of her laden thigh, 115
How fragile! yet of ancestry
Mysteriously remote and high;
High as the imperial front of man;
The roseate bloom on woman's cheek;
The soaring eagle's curvèd beak; 120
The white plumes of the floating swan;
Old as the tiger's paw, the lion's mane
Ere shaken by that mood of stern disdain
At which the desert trembles.--Humming Bee! 124
Thy sting was needless then, perchance unknown,
The seeds of malice were not sown;
All creatures met in peace, from fierceness free,
And no pride blended with their dignity.[248]
--Tears had not broken from their source;
Nor Anguish strayed from her Tartarean den; 130
The golden years maintained a course
Not undiversified though smooth and even;
We were not mocked with glimpse and shadow then,
Bright Seraphs mixed familiarly with men; 134
And earth and stars composed a universal heaven!
A MS. copy of this Ode commences with the following stanza, and goes on
to "And what if his presiding breath," stanza iii. text of 1820.--ED.
Forsake me not, Urania, but when Ev'n
Fades into night, resume the enraptur'd song
That shadowed forth the immensity of Heav'n
In music--uttered surely without wrong
(For 'twas thy work) though here the Listener lay
Couch'd on green herbage 'mid the warmth of May
--A parting promise makes a bright farewell:
Empow'r'd to wait for thy return
Voice of the Heav'ns I will not mourn;
Content that holy peace and mute remembrance dwell
Within the bosom of the chorded shell
Tuned 'mid those seats of love and joy, concealed
By day, by night imperfectly revealed;
Thy native mansions that endure
Beyond their present seeming--pure
From taint of dissolution or decay.
--No blights, no wintry desolations,
Affect those blissful habitations,
Built such as hope might gather from the hue
Profound of the celestial blue,
And from the aspect of each radiant orb,
Some fix'd, some wandering, with no timid curb,
Yet both permitted to proclaim
Their Maker's glory with unaltered frame.
ED.
VARIANTS:
[Footnote 220: 1827.
ODE.--1817. 1820.
1st Edition.
ODE. 1820.
2nd Edition.
]
[Footnote 221: 1836.
... that ... 1820.
]
[Footnote 222: 1827.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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