LUSS! be for ever sunk beneath Ben's horrors piled around: Sun's livening ray ne'er pierce thy gloom, Thy hideous deep be drained! Fishes be turned t'infernal snakes, Boatswain to Cerberus! Mouth of th' Avernian Gulf be thou, Its mortal damp thy air! All o'er thy plains volcanoes thick Their burning sands disgorge! Birds never trill their swelling chaunt, Nor roam the humming bee! Herds never graze, nor sheep nor goat, Nor play the shepherd's lute! Crags other echo ne'er repeat Than dismal Furies' yell! Swift on a morning-ray then, lo! The airy-sandalled god, Mercury, came, and smiling: 'I Thy pillow's treasure stole. Milton no more be fancy's fount Of borrowed ecstasies. Phoebus ordained: presenting, see, The laurel never sere.' | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...RIDDLE: TEETH AND GUMS by MOTHER GOOSE TO GOD AND IRELAND TRUE by ELLEN O'LEARY SONNET by MATILDA BARBARA BETHAM-EDWARDS A SONG FOR THE RAGGED SCHOOLS OF LONDON; WRITTEN IN ROME by ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING APPEARANCES by ROBERT BROWNING HOME, SWEET HOME WITH VARIATIONS: 2. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE by HENRY CUYLER BUNNER |