"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 selfsame 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 famed 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 the music:--Do I wake or sleep?"
As another poet* has said, speaking of Keats's odes, "Greater
lyrical poetry the world may have seen than any that is in these;
lovelier it surely has never seen, nor ever can it possibly see.
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