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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TO A SPIRIT (1) by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN

Poet Analysis

First Line: DEAR (THUS I DARE), HOW I HAVE LONGED
Last Line: WHAT, IF NOT LOVE, I CANNOT TELL.
DEAR (thus I dare), how I have longed
To double, treble, nay, to see
Past computation bloomed and thronged
The love of thee that raptures me:
O were I capable to clasp
Thee with the serene energy,
The more than wrestling-Jacob grasp
Wherewith souls once took hold of thee!

O rosy courage, soft resolve
That pinioned thee so amorous fast --
Thither my passions now convolve
And yearn to whelm thee so at last!
When shall I meet thee on the mead
Where kingcups fawn about thy feet
And by some ivied fountain lead
To tell thee that I find thee sweet?

When the stormed sky forgot its scars
And sunset calmed to thy red smile,
When I have watched the veil of stars
And thought thy glance shone out awhile,
Even when three golden apples hung
In winter dusk from a dim stem,
I knew thee ever blithe and young,
The poet smiling over them.

And over mountains lustred clear
If some have hailed thee, may not I?
In thy own crystal atmosphere
Thy beauty will come glittering by.
As by a sedgy brook I came
On some great white bird unaware,
So in the morning's lonely flame
I'll spy thee with thy streaming hair.

Confused and gross in this my cry,
Let me not lose thee, loving so;
So, thou for once art less than I,
I, mortal, will not let thee go.
Or else, deny this oak, whose bough
Lets honeyed light steal in to rest
Upon thy contemplating brow
That calms the chaffinch on her nest.

Or else, uproot these daisies: beat
The brook's live emerald till it's null,
Tear down this dancing meadowsweet,
Make this hare's fur unbeautiful.
What wouldst thou have, sweet spirit, who
Hast lured me with so many a spell?
Thou smilest deep, thou meanest true --
What, if not love, I cannot tell.



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