BECAUSE, from all that round Thee move, Planets of Beauty, Strength, and Grace, I am elected to Thy love, And have my home in Thy embrace; I wonder all men do not see The crown that Thou hast set on me. Because, when, prostrate at Thy feet, Thou didst emparadise my pain, -- Because Thy heart on mine has beat, Thy head within my hands has lain, I am transfigured, by that sign, Into a being like to Thine. The mirror from its glossy plain Receiving still returns the light, And, being generous of its gain, Augments the very solar might: What unreflected light would be, Is just Thy spirit without me. Thou art the flame, whose rising spire In the dark air sublimely sways, And I the tempest that swift fire Gathers at first and then obeys: All that was Thine ere we were wed Have I by right inherited. Is life a stream? Then from Thy hair One rosebud on the current fell, And straight it turned to crystal there, As adamant immovable: Its steadfast place shall know no more The sense of after and before. Is life a plant? The King of years To mine nor good nor ill can bring; -- Mine grows no more; no more it fears Even the brushing of his wing: With sheathed scythe I see him go, -- I have no flowers that @3he@1 can mow. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...IN THE MILE END ROAD by AMY LEVY THE ARROW AND THE SONG by HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW L'ENVOI: THE RETURN OF THE SIRE DE NESLE, A.D. 16 - by HERMAN MELVILLE THE GRAVE OF LOVE by THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK THE FISHER'S BOY by HENRY DAVID THOREAU THE GODODDIN: CONAN by ANEIRIN TRENCH NOMENCLATURE by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN |