What is it like (you ask perplexed), this fear? -- Fancy yourself compelled to walk a plank From cliff to lofty cliff with reeling shank; Fancy yourself a swimmer, in the rear Of some white ship that nevermore draws near; Fancy yourself entangled in the dank Morasses, with the elephants that sank, As sole companions, save the moon's half-sphere -- 'Tis like such times. The safe bright world of tree And dell and house is round me where I roam, But so estranged, through what's estranged in me, That it seems horribly no more my home. . . In mood, the lost, the panic-stricken child; In intellect, the man, from joy exiled. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...SOMETHING CHILDISH, BUT VERY NATURAL; WRITTEN IN GERMANY by SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE ODE [ON THE POETS] by JOHN KEATS AT MIDSUMMER by LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON OF AN ORCHARD by KATHARINE TYNAN THE HERITAGE FOREGONE by WILLIAM ROSE BENET |