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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


FOR THE CENTENARY OF KEATS'S SONNET by CHRISTOPHER DARLINGTON MORLEY

Poet Analysis

First Line: I KNEW A SCIENTIST, AN ENGINEER
Last Line: MUCH HAVE I TRAVELLED IN THE REALMS OF GOLD.
Subject(s): KEATS, JOHN (1795-1821); POETRY & POETS;

"On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer."

I KNEW a scientist, an engineer,
Student of tensile strengths and calculus,
A man who loved a cantilever truss
And always wore a pencil on his ear.
My friend believed that poets all were queer,
And literary folk ridiculous;
But one night, when it chanced that three of us
Were reading Keats aloud, he stopped to hear.

Lo, a new planet swam into his ken!
His eager mind reached for it and took hold.
Ten years are by: I see him now and then,
And at alumni dinners, if cajoled,
He mumbles gravely, to the cheering men: --
@3Much have I travelled in the realms of gold@1.



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