Poems 1817

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Poems 1817, by John Keats
Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing
this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook.
This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project
Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the
header without written permission.
Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the
eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is
important information about your specific rights and restrictions in how
the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a
donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved.
**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since
1971**
*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of
Volunteers!*****
Title: Poems 1817
Author: John Keats
Release Date: June, 2005 [EBook #8209]
[This file was first posted
on July 2, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
Character set encoding: iso-8859-1
0. START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, POEMS 1817
***

E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram, Thierry A, David King, Charles
Franks, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
POEMS 1817
by
JOHN KEATS
"What more felicity can fall to creature,
Than to enjoy delight with
liberty."
Fate of the Butterfly.--SPENSER.
DEDICATION.
TO LEIGH HUNT, ESQ.
Glory and loveliness have passed away;
For if we wander out in early
morn,
No wreathed incense do we see upborne
Into the east, to
meet the smiling day:
No crowd of nymphs soft voic'd and young,
and gay,
In woven baskets bringing ears of corn,
Roses, and pinks,
and violets, to adorn
The shrine of Flora in her early May.
But there
are left delights as high as these,
And I shall ever bless my destiny,

That in a time, when under pleasant trees
Pan is no longer sought, I
feel a free
A leafy luxury, seeing I could please
With these poor
offerings, a man like thee.
[The Short Pieces in the middle of the Book, as well
as some of the
Sonnets, were written at an earlier
period than the rest of the Poems.]
POEMS.
"Places of nestling green for Poets made."
STORY OF RIMINI.

I stood tip-toe upon a little hill,
The air was cooling, and so very still.

That the sweet buds which with a modest pride
Pull droopingly, in
slanting curve aside,
Their scantly leaved, and finely tapering stems,

Had not yet lost those starry diadems
Caught from the early
sobbing of the morn.
The clouds were pure and white as flocks new
shorn,
And fresh from the clear brook; sweetly they slept
On the
blue fields of heaven, and then there crept
A little noiseless noise
among the leaves,
Born of the very sigh that silence heaves:
For not
the faintest motion could be seen
Of all the shades that slanted o'er
the green.
There was wide wand'ring for the greediest eye,
To peer
about upon variety;
Far round the horizon's crystal air to skim,
And
trace the dwindled edgings of its brim;
To picture out the quaint, and
curious bending
Of a fresh woodland alley, never ending;
Or by the
bowery clefts, and leafy shelves,
Guess were the jaunty streams
refresh themselves.
I gazed awhile, and felt as light, and free
As
though the fanning wings of Mercury
Had played upon my heels: I
was light-hearted,
And many pleasures to my vision started;
So I
straightway began to pluck a posey
Of luxuries bright, milky, soft and
rosy.
A bush of May flowers with the bees about them;
Ah, sure no tasteful
nook would be without them;
And let a lush laburnum oversweep
them,
And let long grass grow round the roots to keep them
Moist,
cool and green; and shade the violets,
That they may bind the moss in
leafy nets.
A filbert hedge with wild briar overtwined,
And clumps of woodbine
taking the soft wind
Upon their summer thrones; there too should be

The frequent chequer of a youngling tree,
That with a score of light
green brethen shoots
From the quaint mossiness of aged roots:

Round which is heard a spring-head of clear waters

Babbling so
wildly of its lovely daughters
The spreading blue bells: it may haply
mourn
That such fair clusters should be rudely torn
From their fresh

beds, and scattered thoughtlessly
By infant hands, left on the path to
die.
Open afresh your round of starry folds,
Ye ardent marigolds!
Dry
up the moisture from your golden lids,
For great Apollo bids
That
in these days your praises should be sung
On many harps, which he
has lately strung;
And when again your dewiness he kisses,
Tell
him, I have you in my world of blisses:
So haply when I rove in some
far vale,
His mighty voice may come upon the gale.
Here are sweet peas, on tip-toe for a flight:
With wings of gentle flush
o'er delicate white,
And taper fulgent catching at all things,
To bind
them all about with tiny rings.
Linger awhile upon some bending planks
That lean against a
streamlet's rushy banks,
And watch intently Nature's gentle doings:

They will be found