There is in souls a sympathy with sounds;
And, as the mind is pitch'd, the ear is pleas'd
With melting airs, or martial, brisk, or grave:
Some chord in unison with what we hear
Is touch'd within us, and the heart replies.
How soft the music of those village bells,
Falling at intervals upon the ear
...
The Test of Love — is Death —
Our Lord — "so loved" — it saith —
What Largest Lover — hath
Another — doth —
If smaller Patience — be —
Through less Infinity —
If Bravo, sometimes swerve —
Through fainter Nerve —
Accept its Most —
And overlook — the Dust —...
The Things that never can come back, are several —
Childhood — some forms of Hope — the Dead —
Though Joys — like Men — may sometimes make a Journey —
And still abide —
We do not mourn for Traveler, or Sailor,
Their Routes are fair —
But think enlarged of all that they will tell us
Returning...
The things we thought that we should do
We other things have done
But those peculiar industries
Have never been begun —
The Lands we thought that we should seek
When large enough to run
By Speculation ceded
To Speculation's Son —
The Heaven, in which we hoped to pause...
The thought beneath so slight a film —
Is more distinctly seen —
As laces just reveal the surge —
Or mists — the Apennine
The Thrill came slowly like a Boom for
Centuries delayed
It's fitness growing like the Flood
In sumptuous solitude —
The desolation only missed
While Rapture changed it's Dress
And stood arrayed before the Change
In ravished Holiness —
The Tint I cannot take — is best —
The Color too remote
That I could show it in Bazaar —
A Guinea at a sight —
The fine — impalpable Array —
That swaggers on the eye
Like Cleopatra's Company —
Repeated — in the sky —
The Moments of Dominion
That happen on...
The Treason of an accent
Might Ecstasy transfer —
Of her effacing Fathom
Is no Recoverer —
—
The Treason of an Accent
Might vilify the Joy —
To breathe — corrode the rapture
Of Sanctity to be —
The Trees like Tassels — hit — and swung —
There seemed to rise a Tune
From Miniature Creatures
Accompanying the Sun —
Far Psalteries of Summer —
Enamoring the Ear
They never yet did satisfy —
Remotest — when most fair
The Sun shone whole at intervals —
...