I See the cloud-born squadrons of the gale,
Their lines of rain like glittering spears deprest,
While all the affrighted land grows darkly pale
In flashing charge on earth’s half-shielded breast.
Sounds like the rush of trampling columns float
From that fierce conflict; volleyed thunders peal,
Blent with the maddened wind’s wild bugle-...
More than the wind, more than the snow,
More than the sunshine, I love rain:
Whether it droppeth soft and low,
Whether it rusheth amain.
Dark as the night it spreadeth its wings,
Slow and silently, up on the hills;
Then sweeps o’er the vale, like a steed that springs
From the grasp of a thousand wills.
Swift sweeps...
And now behold your tender nurse, the air,
And common neighbor that aye runs around,
How many pictures and impressions fair
Within her empty regions are there found,
Which to your senses dancing do propound!
For what are breath, speech, echoes, music, winds,
But dancings of the air in sundry kinds?
For when you breathe, the air in...
From “Wicklow”
YES, this is Wicklow; round our feet
And o’er our heads its woodlands smile;
Behold it, love—the garden sweet
And playground of our stormy isle.* * * * *
Is it not fair—the leafy land?
Not boasting Nature’s sterner pride,
Voluptuous beauty, scenes that stand
By minds immortal...
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
The wingèd seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each...
From the Greek by Andrew Lang
From “The Clouds”
SOCRATES SPEAKS.
HITHER, come hither, ye Clouds renowned, and unveil yourselves here;
Come, though ye dwell on the sacred crests of Olympian snow,
Or whether ye dance with the Nereid Choir in the gardens clear,
Or whether your golden urns are dipped in Nile’s overflow,
Or whether you...
I Bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams;
I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams.
From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet buds every one,
When rocked to rest on their mother’s breast,
As she dances about the sun.
I wield the flail of...
I Love at eventide to walk alone,
Down narrow glens, o’erhung with dewy thorn,
Where from the long grass underneath, the snail,
Jet black, creeps out, and sprouts his timid horn.
I love to muse o’er meadows newly mown,
Where withering grass perfumes the sultry air;
Where bees search round, with sad and weary drone,
In vain, for flowers...
Quivering fears, heart-tearing cares,
Anxious sighs, untimely tears,
Fly, fly to courts,
Fly to fond worldlings’ sports,
Where strained sardonic smiles are glozing still,
And grief is forced to laugh against her will,
Where mirth ’s but mummery,
And sorrows only real be.
Fly from our country pastimes, fly...
I In these flowery meads would be,
These crystal streams should solace me;
To whose harmonious bubbling noise
I, with my angle, would rejoice,
Sit here, and see the turtle-dove
Court his chaste mate to acts of love;
Or, on that bank, feel the west-wind
Breathe health and plenty; please my mind,
To see sweet dew-drops...
