POEMS ON THE IMAGINATION THE REALM OF FANCY EVER let the Fancy roam; Pleasure never is at home: At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth, Then let wingéd Fancy wander Through the thought still spread beyond her: Open wide the mind's cage-door, She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar. O sweet Fancy! let her loose; When the soundless earth is muffled, And the cakéd snow is shuffled From the ploughboy's heavy shoon; To banish Even from her sky. Sit thee there, and send abroad, With a mind self-overaw'd, Fancy, high-commission'd:-send her! She has vassals to attend her: She will bring, in spite of frost, And thou shalt quaff it:-thou shalt hear Rustle of the reapéd corn; Sweet birds antheming the morn: And, in the same moment-hark! Or the rooks, with busy caw, Sapphire queen of the mid-May; And every leaf, and every flower Pearléd with the self-same shower. When the bee-hive casts its swarm; Acorns ripe down-pattering, Oh, sweet Fancy! let her loose; Where's the cheek that doth not fade, At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth While she held the goblet sweet, And Jove grew languid.-Break the mesh Of the Fancy's silken leash; Quickly break her prison-string, And such joys as these she'll bring. Let the wingéd Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home. J. Keats. KUBLA KHAN IN Xanadu did Kubla Khan So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round: And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills Where blossom'd many an incense-bearing tree; And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover! A savage place! as holy and enchanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman wailing for her demon-lover! And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, The shadow of the dome of pleasure Where was heard the mingled measure A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice! In a vision once I saw: It was an Abyssinian maid, And on her dulcimer she play'd, Could I revive within me Her symphony and song, To such a deep delight 'twould win me I would build that dome in air, That sunny dome! those caves of ice! And close your eyes with holy dread, And drank the milk of Paradise. S. T. Coleridge. THE POET'S DREAM ON a Poet's lips I slept Dreaming like a love-adept In the sound his breathing kept; Nor seeks nor finds he mortal blisses, But feeds on the aërial kisses Of shapes that haunt Thought's wildernesses. He will watch from dawn to gloom The lake-reflected sun illume The yellow bees in the ivy-bloom, Nor heed nor see what things they be |