IF

POEM: IF BY RUDYARD KIPLING

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream- -and not make dreams your master;
If you can think- -and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on! '

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings- -nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And- -which is more- -you'll be a Man, my son!

She Was a Phantom of Delight

BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

She was a Phantom of delight 

When first she gleamed upon my sight; 

A lovely Apparition, sent 

To be a moment's ornament; 

Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair; 

Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair; 

But all things else about her drawn 

From May-time and the cheerful Dawn; 

A dancing Shape, an Image gay, 

To haunt, to startle, and way-lay. 

I saw her upon nearer view, 

A Spirit, yet a Woman too! 

Her household motions light and free, 

And steps of virgin-liberty; 

A countenance in which did meet 

Sweet records, promises as sweet; 

A Creature not too bright or good 

For human nature's daily food; 

For transient sorrows, simple wiles, 

Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles. 

And now I see with eye serene 

The very pulse of the machine; 

A Being breathing thoughtful breath, 

A Traveller between life and death; 

The reason firm, the temperate will, 

Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill; 

A perfect Woman, nobly planned, 

To warn, to comfort, and command; 

And yet a Spirit still, and bright 

With something of angelic light. 

jayadevas songs with meanings.

Jayadeva (11th century)Poet Sri Jayadeva was born in 11th century in Bindu Bilva village near Puri Jagannath Temple in Orissa. His wife Padmavati, was an accomplished temple dancer. He was very much influenced by the culture and devotion of Vaishnava Brahmanas. It is believed that Sri Chaitanya Maha Prabhu also visited him. Poet Jayadeva's magnum opus "Gita Govinda' is one of the most popular compositions in Sanskrit language, describing the divine love of Radha and Krishna. It is lyrical poetry divided into 'Prabandhas' which contain couplets grouped into eights called 'Ashtapadis'. The poems describe the attraction between Radha and Krishna,their separation, their yearning and union with the assistance of Radha's Sakhee (confidante) are very engrossing. Ashtapadis have a very important place in Indian Classical dance and music. Excellent lyricism, exquisite vocabulary, alliteration and description of divine love have unique place in literature. Gita Govinda overflows with 'Madhura Bhakti' known as one of the nine forms of devotion to God. I have my own limits to venture translating fully the descriptions of sports of love. Only Jayadeva who was immersed in devotion to the divine couple Radha and Krishna could outpour his ecstasy and admiration uniquely. I acknowledge my hearty gratitude to 'Vavilla Rama Sastry & Sons' whose publication 'Gita Govinda Kavyam', a Telugu translation of Poet Jayadeva's immortal classic, helped me to understand the Sanskrit work.

Ashtapadis praLaya payOdhi jalE Srita kamalA lalita lavanga chandana charchita sancharadadhara sakhee hE kEsi madhana sA virahE tava deenA rAdhikA krishNA tava virahE vanamAli dheera sameerE nAda harE yAmi hE kAmiha kApi madhuripunA ramatE yamunA pulina sakhee yA ramitA yAhi mAdhava hari hari hatAdaratayA mAdhavE mAkuru priyE chAru SeelE mugdhE madhu praviSa rAdhE harimEka rasam kshaNa madhuna nijagAda sA yadunandanE Ehi murAree

cambridge nov 2018

Three Years She Grew

BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

Three years she grew in sun and shower, 

Then Nature said, "A lovelier flower 

On earth was never sown; 

This Child I to myself will take; 

She shall be mine, and I will make 

A Lady of my own. 

"Myself will to my darling be 

Both law and impulse: and with me 

The Girl, in rock and plain, 

In earth and heaven, in glade and bower, 

Shall feel an overseeing power 

To kindle or restrain. 

"She shall be sportive as the fawn 

That wild with glee across the lawn 

Or up the mountain springs; 

And hers shall be the breathing balm, 

And hers the silence and the calm 

Of mute insensate things. 

"The floating clouds their state shall lend 

To her; for her the willow bend; 

Nor shall she fail to see 

Even in the motions of the Storm 

Grace that shall mould the Maiden's form 

By silent sympathy. 

"The stars of midnight shall be dear 

To her; and she shall lean her ear 

In many a secret place 

Where rivulets dance their wayward round, 

And beauty born of murmuring sound 

Shall pass into her face. 

"And vital feelings of delight 

Shall rear her form to stately height, 

Her virgin bosom swell; 

Such thoughts to Lucy I will give 

While she and I together live 

Here in this happy dell." 

Thus Nature spake—The work was done— 

How soon my Lucy's race was run! 

She died, and left to me 

This heath, this calm and quiet scene; 

The memory of what has been, 

And never more will be. 

Lord Ullin's Daughter by Thomas Campbell A chieftain to the Highlands bound Cries ‘Boatman, do not tarry! And I’ll give thee a silver pound To row us o’er the ferry!’   ‘Now who be ye, would cross Lochgyle This dark and stormy water?’ ‘O I’m the chief of Ulva’s isle, And this, Lord Ullin’s daughter.   ‘And fast before her father’s men Three days we’ve fled together, For should he find us in the glen, My blood would stain the heather.   ‘His horsemen hard behind us ride— Should they our steps discover, Then who will cheer my bonny bride When they have slain her lover?   Out spoke the hardy Highland wight, ‘I’ll go, my chief, I’m ready: It is not for your silver bright, But for your winsome lady:—   ‘And by my word! the bonny bird In danger shall not tarry; So though the waves are raging white I’ll row you o’er the ferry.’   By this the storm grew loud apace, The water-wraith was shrieking; And in the scowl of heaven each face Grew dark as they were speaking.   But still as wilder blew the wind And as the night grew drearer, Adown the glen rode arméd men, Their trampling sounded nearer.   ‘O haste thee, haste!’ the lady cries, Though tempests round us gather; I’ll meet the raging of the skies, But not an angry father.’   The boat has left a stormy land, A stormy sea before her,— When, O! too strong for human hand The tempest gather’d o’er her.   And still they row’d amidst the roar Of waters fast prevailing: Lord Ullin reach’d that fatal shore,— His wrath was changed to wailing.   For, sore dismay’d, through storm and shade His child he did discover:— One lovely hand she stretch’d for aid, And one was round her lover.   ‘Come back! Come back!’ he cried in grief ‘Across this stormy water: And I’ll forgive your Highland chief, My daughter!—O my daughter!’   ‘Twas vain: the loud waves lash’d the shore, Return or aid preventing: The waters wild went o’er his child, And he was left lamenting. Home they brought her warrior dead. Alfred Tennyson. Home they brought her warrior dead:  She nor swooned, nor uttered cry:  All her maidens, watching, said,  ‘She must weep or she will die.’  Then they praised him, soft and low,  Called him worthy to be loved,  Truest friend and noblest foe;  Yet she neither spoke nor moved.  Stole a maiden from her place,  Lightly to the warrior stepped,  Took the face-cloth from the face;  Yet she neither moved nor wept.  Rose a nurse of ninety years,  Set his child upon her knee—  Like summer tempest came her tears—  ‘Sweet my child, I live for thee.’ She Walks in Beauty BY LORD BYRON (GEORGE GORDON) She walks in beauty, like the night  Of cloudless climes and starry skies;  And all that’s best of dark and bright  Meet in her aspect and her eyes;  Thus mellowed to that tender light  Which heaven to gaudy day denies.  One shade the more, one ray the less,  Had half impaired the nameless grace  Which waves in every raven tress,  Or softly lightens o’er her face;  Where thoughts serenely sweet express,  How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.  And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,  So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,  The smiles that win, the tints that glow,  But tell of days in goodness spent,  A mind at peace with all below,  A heart whose love is innocent! Annabel Lee BY EDGAR ALLAN POE It was many and many a year ago,     In a kingdom by the sea,  That a maiden there lived whom you may know     By the name of Annabel Lee;  And this maiden she lived with no other thought     Than to love and be loved by me.  I was a child and she was a child,     In this kingdom by the sea,  But we loved with a love that was more than love—     I and my Annabel Lee—  With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven     Coveted her and me.  And this was the reason that, long ago,     In this kingdom by the sea,  A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling     My beautiful Annabel Lee;  So that her highborn kinsmen came     And bore her away from me,  To shut her up in a sepulchre     In this kingdom by the sea.  The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,     Went envying her and me—  Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,     In this kingdom by the sea)  That the wind came out of the cloud by night,     Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.  But our love it was stronger by far than the love     Of those who were older than we—     Of many far wiser than we—  And neither the angels in Heaven above     Nor the demons down under the sea  Can ever dissever my soul from the soul     Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;  For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams     Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;  And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes     Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;  And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side     Of my darling—my darling—my life  Song: Sweetest love, I do not go John Donne, 1572 - 1631 Sweetest love, I do not go, For weariness of thee, Nor in hope the world can show A fitter love for me; But since that I Must die at last, 'tis best To use myself in jest Thus by feign'd deaths to die. Yesternight the sun went hence, And yet is here today; He hath no desire nor sense, Nor half so short a way: Then fear not me, But believe that I shall make Speedier journeys, since I take More wings and spurs than he. O how feeble is man's power, That if good fortune fall, Cannot add another hour, Nor a lost hour recall! But come bad chance, And we join to'it our strength, And we teach it art and length, Itself o'er us to'advance. When thou sigh'st, thou sigh'st not wind, But sigh'st my soul away; When thou weep'st, unkindly kind, My life's blood doth decay. It cannot be That thou lov'st me, as thou say'st, If in thine my life thou waste, That art the best of me. Let not thy divining heart Forethink me any ill; Destiny may take thy part, And may thy fears fulfil; But think that we Are but turn'd aside to sleep; They who one another keep  Alive, ne'er parted be.

boston diaries. recollect

Lochinvar

 SIR WALTER SCOTT

O young Lochinvar is come out of the west, 

Through all the wide Border his steed was the best; 

And save his good broadsword he weapons had none, 

He rode all unarm’d, and he rode all alone. 

So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war, 

There never was knight like the young Lochinvar. 

He staid not for brake, and he stopp’d not for stone, 

He swam the Eske river where ford there was none; 

But ere he alighted at Netherby gate, 

The bride had consented, the gallant came late: 

For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war, 

Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar. 

So boldly he enter’d the Netherby Hall, 

Among bride’s-men, and kinsmen, and brothers and all: 

Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword, 

(For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word,) 

“O come ye in peace here, or come ye in war, 

Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?” 

“I long woo’d your daughter, my suit you denied;— 

Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide— 

And now I am come, with this lost love of mine, 

To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine. 

There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far, 

That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.” 

The bride kiss’d the goblet: the knight took it up, 

He quaff’d off the wine, and he threw down the cup. 

She look’d down to blush, and she look’d up to sigh, 

With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye. 

He took her soft hand, ere her mother could bar,— 

“Now tread we a measure!” said young Lochinvar. 

So stately his form, and so lovely her face, 

That never a hall such a galliard did grace; 

While her mother did fret, and her father did fume, 

And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume; 

And the bride-maidens whisper’d, “’twere better by far 

To have match’d our fair cousin with young Lochinvar.” 

One touch to her hand, and one word in her ear, 

When they reach’d the hall-door, and the charger stood near; 

So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung, 

So light to the saddle before her he sprung! 

“She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur; 

They’ll have fleet steeds that follow,” quoth young Lochinvar. 

There was mounting ’mong Graemes of the Netherby clan; 

Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran: 

There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee, 

But the lost bride of Netherby ne’er did they see. 

So daring in love, and so dauntless in war, 

Have ye e’er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar? 

It never comes again / The flight of youth.

richard henry stoddard.

THERE are gains for all our losses,   There are balms for all our pain, But when youth, the dream, departs, It takes something from our hearts,   And it never comes again.         5 We are stronger, and are better,   Under manhood’s sterner reign; Still we feel that something sweet Followed youth, with flying feet,   And will never come again.         10 Something beautiful is vanished,   And we sigh for it in vain; We behold it everywhere, On the earth, and in the air,   But it never comes again.         15

The poem dramatizes the relationship between youth and aging, discussing the speaker’s solemn loss of youth and longing for what is absent in elderly life. Youth “departs” from the speaker, followed “with flying feet” by youth’s sweetness, and this departure and image of flight characterizes youth as a bird that has flown away (3, 9). Youth is said to be “the dream” and described as “beautiful,” and Stoddard’s positive characterization of youth contrasts with his description of the speaker’s current situation in adulthood (3, 11). It is also important to note that the speaker is not just speaking for him- or herself; rather, the use of plural pronouns such as “our” and “we” enables the speaker to speak for all who have lost their youth (1, 4). Additionally, by speaking for all, the speaker can include the audience in his poem, as if the reader himself were speaking, drawing the reader closer to the subject matter.

            Two different titles of the poem must first be discussed before further examining the poem. In Virginia Lucas’ Poetry Scrapbook, the title is transcribed as “There Are Gains for All Our Losses.” However, in Edmund Clarence Stedman’s An American Anthology, 1787-1900, the title is proclaimed to be “The Flight of Youth.” These two different titles incite two different implications for the poem. In Virginia Lucas’ version, the title “There Are Gains for All Our Losses” emphasizes the first line of the poem, which asserts that as one ages one gains but also loses. The equilibrium attained by this balancing act is less sorrowful than the rest of the poem, which focuses more on the vanishing of youth instead of the “gains” of aging. The other title, “The Flight of Youth,” emphasizes the zoomorphic image of youth as a bird that is alluded to in the poem, and this focuses the reader on the visualization of youth flying away from the speaker. This “flight” contributes to the fleeting feeling of youth described in the poem. To decide which title is “correct” is not the goal of this paper, but it is important to note that both titles most likely were “correct” at one point in time. Virginia Lucas’ scrapbook is mostly her own transcriptions of others’ poems, so it is not impossible that she copied down this title from some sort of publication she stumbled across. As for the other title showcased in Stedman’s anthology, this is currently the most popular title based on surviving publications of the poem and became the “correct” title by being published this way multiple times.
            The poem begins with a riddle of sorts, with the speaker saying: “There are gains for all our losses, / There are balms for all our pain” (1-2). The speaker asserts that with each negative event that occurs in our life, there is a positive correlate that accompanies it. With each pain, there is a medicine to soothe that pain. However, the speaker then contradicts himself, saying that when “youth, the dream, departs, / It takes something from our hearts, / And it never comes again” (3-5). By slowing the poem’s rhythm down at the end of line 3 with the use of commas and the alliterative repetition of “dream” and “departs,” the speaker draws attention to youth’s exit. The speaker fails to point out any gains that accompany the loss of youth, depicting youth’s departure as solemn and melancholy. Youth “takes something from our hearts” as it exits, and this line draws parallels to heartbreak. By declaring that youth “never comes again” in line 5, the speaker’s sense of finality at the end of this stanza mirrors the finality of youth’s exit.
            It is important to pause here and note the repetition of line 5. The line is repeated at the end of each of the three stanzas, which drives the sense of sadness that Stoddard connects with youth’s dramatic exit. Additionally, the poem’s rhyme scheme helps illustrate the finality Stoddard inserts into the aging process with this line. Each stanza conforms to an ABCCB pattern. The rhyming couplet between the third and fourth line divides the slant rhyme of the second and fifth line. The rhyme scheme incorporates the final line into the stanza, keeping line 2 and 5 of each stanza repeatedly linked, and the slant rhyme places stress on the final syllable of line 5 in order to force this link. The slant rhyme spotlights the final line, just as the repetition of the line aims to do.
            In addition to the rhyme scheme emphasizing the last syllable of the last line, the meter also highlights this last syllable by stressing it. The poem is in trochaic tetrameter with a few things to note. The first line of each stanza has eight syllables, all of which conform to trochaic tetrameter. The last syllable of the first line in every stanza is unstressed, leading the reader to jump to the next line for the next stressed syllable. However, the rest of the lines of each stanza have seven syllables, forcing these lines to be classified as catalectic verse, which means that there is an incomplete foot. The trochaic pattern is continued in the catalexis, which puts emphasis on the last syllable of the last four lines of each stanza. This emphasis forces the slant rhyme between lines 2 and 5, placing stress on the last syllable in “again,” forcing the last syllable to be read like gain. Interestingly, by forcing the word again to sound like gain, the poet infuses the first line of the poem into the last line of each stanza, creating continuity. The highlighting of this line creates a melancholy mood in the piece, and the feeling of loss at the exit of youth is analogous to how the loss of a loved one is usually portrayed with the same solemn tone. This loss of youth—which comes as of yet with no gain in the poem—is being cast as if the speaker is mourning his younger self.
            In the second stanza, the speaker characterizes people whose youth has departed as “stronger” and “better / Under manhood’s sterner reign” (6-7). The speaker again contradicts himself—in the first stanza, there were no positive correlates with youth’s departure, but now, we have a balm for the pain of youth’s flight. The speaker asserts that a life without youth is “better,” but there is no flowery language to accompany this description, and this mirrors the “sterner” life that the older generations are described as having. However, the speaker then once again shifts his focus to the negatives of losing youth, saying “that something sweet / Followed youth with flying feet” (8-9). The “something sweet” is unnamed, as if the speaker is ruminating on what is missing in his aged life. These lines both end with alliteration in addition to rhyming. Both alliterative sounds, “f” and “s,” are soft semivowels, and their soft sounds contribute to the lightness of what is being said. The weightlessness of the sounds mirrors the weightlessness of the metaphorical flight. Here we see some detailed imagery, characterizing the beauty of youth and further contrasting life with youth and life without it.
            The flowery language continues at the start of the final stanza, when the speaker says: “Something beautiful has vanished / And we sigh for it in rain” (11-12). The choice to incorporate rain in this stanza furthers the melancholy mood while also characterizing the aging process as depressing—grey clouds accompany rain, and the absence of sunshine deepens the dark mood. The action of the speaker sighing for youth and “behold[ing] it everywhere” characterizes youth again as a lost lover or departed family member. The speaker is in mourning. Seeing youth as dead in the speaker’s eyes confirms the finality of the last line: “It never comes again” (15). Coping with the loss of youth, the speaker fails to find comfort at the end of the poem, leaving the reader with the description of the loss instead of a resolution or acceptance of the fact. While the poet opens the poem by saying “there are gains for all our losses,” the speaker gives the audience no gains in the face of the loss of youth.

Ode to a NightingaleOde to a Nightingale

BY JOHN KEATS

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains 

         My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk, 

Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains 

         One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk: 

'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot, 

         But being too happy in thine happiness,— 

                That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees 

                        In some melodious plot 

         Of beechen green, and shadows numberless, 

                Singest of summer in full-throated ease. 

O, for a draught of vintage! that hath been 

         Cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth, 

Tasting of Flora and the country green, 

         Dance, and Provençal song, and sunburnt mirth! 

O for a beaker full of the warm South, 

         Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene, 

                With beaded bubbles winking at the brim, 

                        And purple-stained mouth; 

         That I might drink, and leave the world unseen, 

                And with thee fade away into the forest dim: 

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget 

         What thou among the leaves hast never known, 

The weariness, the fever, and the fret 

         Here, where men sit and hear each other groan; 

Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, 

         Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies; 

                Where but to think is to be full of sorrow 

                        And leaden-eyed despairs, 

         Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes, 

                Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow. 

Away! away! for I will fly to thee, 

         Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards, 

But on the viewless wings of Poesy, 

         Though the dull brain perplexes and retards: 

Already with thee! tender is the night, 

         And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne, 

                Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays; 

                        But here there is no light, 

         Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown 

                Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy ways. 

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet, 

         Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs, 

But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet 

         Wherewith the seasonable month endows 

The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild; 

         White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine; 

                Fast fading violets cover'd up in leaves; 

                        And mid-May's eldest child, 

         The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine, 

                The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves. 

Darkling I listen; and, for many a time 

         I have been half in love with easeful Death, 

Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme, 

         To take into the air my quiet breath; 

                Now more than ever seems it rich to die, 

         To cease upon the midnight with no pain, 

                While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad 

                        In such an ecstasy! 

         Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain— 

                   To thy high requiem become a sod. 

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird! 

         No hungry generations tread thee down; 

The voice I hear this passing night was heard 

         In ancient days by emperor and clown: 

Perhaps the self-same song that found a path 

         Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home, 

                She stood in tears amid the alien corn; 

                        The same that oft-times hath 

         Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam 

                Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn. 

Forlorn! the very word is like a bell 

         To toll me back from thee to my sole self! 

Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well 

         As she is fam'd to do, deceiving elf. 

Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades 

         Past the near meadows, over the still stream, 

                Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep 

                        In the next valley-glades: 

         Was it a vision, or a waking dream? 

                Fled is that music:—Do I wake or sleep? 

Summary

The speaker opens with a declaration of his own heartache. He feels numb, as though he had taken a drug only a moment ago. He is addressing a nightingale he hears singing somewhere in the forest and says that his “drowsy numbness” is not from envy of the nightingale’s happiness, but rather from sharing it too completely; he is “too happy” that the nightingale sings the music of summer from amid some unseen plot of green trees and shadows.

In the second stanza, the speaker longs for the oblivion of alcohol, expressing his wish for wine, “a draught of vintage,” that would taste like the country and like peasant dances, and let him “leave the world unseen” and disappear into the dim forest with the nightingale. In the third stanza, he explains his desire to fade away, saying he would like to forget the troubles the nightingale has never known: “the weariness, the fever, and the fret” of human life, with its consciousness that everything is mortal and nothing lasts. Youth “grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies,” and “beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes.”

In the fourth stanza, the speaker tells the nightingale to fly away, and he will follow, not through alcohol (“Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards”), but through poetry, which will give him “viewless wings.” He says he is already with the nightingale and describes the forest glade, where even the moonlight is hidden by the trees, except the light that breaks through when the breezes blow the branches. In the fifth stanza, the speaker says that he cannot see the flowers in the glade, but can guess them “in embalmed darkness”: white hawthorne, eglantine, violets, and the musk-rose, “the murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves.” In the sixth stanza, the speaker listens in the dark to the nightingale, saying that he has often been “half in love” with the idea of dying and called Death soft names in many rhymes. Surrounded by the nightingale’s song, the speaker thinks that the idea of death seems richer than ever, and he longs to “cease upon the midnight with no pain” while the nightingale pours its soul ecstatically forth. If he were to die, the nightingale would continue to sing, he says, but he would “have ears in vain” and be no longer able to hear.

In the seventh stanza, the speaker tells the nightingale that it is immortal, that it was not “born for death.” He says that the voice he hears singing has always been heard, by ancient emperors and clowns, by homesick Ruth; he even says the song has often charmed open magic windows looking out over “the foam / Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.” In the eighth stanza, the word forlorn tolls like a bell to restore the speaker from his preoccupation with the nightingale and back into himself. As the nightingale flies farther away from him, he laments that his imagination has failed him and says that he can no longer recall whether the nightingale’s music was “a vision, or a waking dream.” Now that the music is gone, the speaker cannot recall whether he himself is awake or asleep.
Form
Like most of the other odes, “Ode to a Nightingale” is written in ten-line stanzas. However, unlike most of the other poems, it is metrically variable—though not so much as “Ode to Psyche.” The first seven and last two lines of each stanza are written in iambic pentameter; the eighth line of each stanza is written in trimeter, with only three accented syllables instead of five. “Nightingale” also differs from the other odes in that its rhyme scheme is the same in every stanza (every other ode varies the order of rhyme in the final three or four lines except “To Psyche,” which has the loosest structure of all the odes). Each stanza in “Nightingale” is rhymed ABABCDECDE, Keats’s most basic scheme throughout the odes.

Themes

With “Ode to a Nightingale,” Keats’s speaker begins his fullest and deepest exploration of the themes of creative expression and the mortality of human life. In this ode, the transience of life and the tragedy of old age (“where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, / Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies”) is set against the eternal renewal of the nightingale’s fluid music (“Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird!”). The speaker reprises the “drowsy numbness” he experienced in “Ode on Indolence,” but where in “Indolence” that numbness was a sign of disconnection from experience, in “Nightingale” it is a sign of too full a connection: “being too happy in thine happiness,” as the speaker tells the nightingale. Hearing the song of the nightingale, the speaker longs to flee the human world and join the bird. His first thought is to reach the bird’s state through alcohol—in the second stanza, he longs for a “draught of vintage” to transport him out of himself. But after his meditation in the third stanza on the transience of life, he rejects the idea of being “charioted by Bacchus and his pards” (Bacchus was the Roman god of wine and was supposed to have been carried by a chariot pulled by leopards) and chooses instead to embrace, for the first time since he refused to follow the figures in “Indolence,” “the viewless wings of Poesy

Song of the brook.

I come from haunts of coot and hern, 
I make a sudden sally 
And sparkle out among the fern, 
To bicker down a valley. 

By thirty hills I hurry down, 
Or slip between the ridges, 
By twenty thorpes, a little town, 
And half a hundred bridges. 

Till last by Philip's farm I flow 
To join the brimming river, 
For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on for ever. 

I chatter over stony ways, 
In little sharps and trebles, 
I bubble into eddying bays, 
I babble on the pebbles. 

With many a curve my banks I fret 
By many a field and fallow, 
And many a fairy foreland set 
With willow-weed and mallow. 

I chatter, chatter, as I flow 
To join the brimming river, 
For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on for ever. 

I wind about, and in and out, 
With here a blossom sailing, 
And here and there a lusty trout, 
And here and there a grayling, 

And here and there a foamy flake 
Upon me, as I travel 
With many a silvery waterbreak 
Above the golden gravel, 

And draw them all along, and flow 
To join the brimming river 
For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on for ever. 

I steal by lawns and grassy plots, 
I slide by hazel covers; 
I move the sweet forget-me-nots 
That grow for happy lovers. 

I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance, 
Among my skimming swallows; 
I make the netted sunbeam dance 
Against my sandy shallows. 

I murmur under moon and stars 
In brambly wildernesses; 
I linger by my shingly bars; 
I loiter round my cresses; 

And out again I curve and flow 
To join the brimming river, 
For men may come and men may go, 

    But I go on for ever.

The Inchcape Rock

Robert Southey (1774–1843)

NO stir in the air, no stir in the sea, The ship was still as she could be; Her sails from heaven received no motion; Her keel was steady in the ocean. Without either sign or sound of their shock,         5 The waves flowed over the Inchcape Rock; So little they rose, so little they fell, They did not move the Inchcape Bell. The Abbot of Aberbrothok Had placed that bell on the Inchcape Rock;         10 On a buoy in the storm it floated and swung, And over the waves its warning rung. When the rock was hid by the surge’s swell, The mariners heard the warning bell; And then they knew the perilous rock,         15 And blest the Abbot of Aberbrothok. The sun in heaven was shining gay; All things were joyful on that day; The sea-birds screamed as they wheeled round, And there was joyance in their sound.         20 The buoy of the Inchcape Bell was seen, A darker speck on the ocean green: Sir Ralph the Rover walked his deck, And he fixed his eye on the darker speck. He felt the cheering power of spring;         25 It made him whistle, it made him sing: His heart was mirthful to excess, But the Rover’s mirth was wickedness. His eye was on the Inchcape float; Quoth he, “My men, put out the boat,         30 And row me to the Inchcape Rock, And I ’ll plague the Abbot of Aberbrothok.” The boat is lowered, the boatmen row, And to the Inchcape Rock they go; Sir Ralph bent over from the boat,         35 And he cut the bell from the Inchcape float. Down sunk the bell with a gurgling sound; The bubbles rose and burst around: Quoth Sir Ralph, “The next who comes to the rock Won’t bless the Abbot of Aberbrothok.”         40 Sir Ralph the Rover sailed away; He scoured the seas for many a day; And now, grown rich with plundered store, He steers his course for Scotland’s shore. So thick a haze o’erspreads the sky,         45 They cannot see the sun on high: The wind hath blown a gale all day; At evening it hath died away. On the deck the Rover takes his stand; So dark it is, they see no land.         50 Quoth Sir Ralph, “It will be lighter soon, For there is the dawn of the rising moon.” “Canst hear,” said one, “the breakers roar? For methinks we should be near the shore.” “Now where we are I cannot tell,         55 But I wish I could hear the Inchcape Bell.” They hear no sound; the swell is strong; Though the wind hath fallen, they drift along, Till the vessel strikes with a shivering shock: “O Christ! it is the Inchcape Rock!”         60 Sir Ralph the Rover tore his hair, He curst himself in his despair: The waves rush in on every side; The ship is sinking beneath the tide. But even in his dying fear         65 One dreadful sound could the Rover hear,— A sound as if, with the Inchcape Bell, The Devil below was ringing his knell.