SELECTIONS FROM COLERIDGE THE EOLIAN HARP. COMPOSED AT CLEVEDON, SOMERSETSHIRE. My pensive Sara! thy soft cheek reclined Thus on mine arm, most soothing sweet it is With white-flowered Jasmin and the broad-leaved Myrtle (Meet emblems they of Innocence and Love!), And watch the clouds, that late were rich with light, Serenely brilliant (such should wisdom be) Shine opposite! How exquisite the scents Snatched from yon bean-field! and the world so hushed! 10 The stilly murmur of the distant Sea Tells us of Silence. And that simplest Lute, Placed lengthways in the clasping casement, hark! How by the desultory breeze caressed, Like some coy maid half yielding to her lover, It pours such sweet upbraiding, as must needs Over delicious surges sink and rise, 20 Footless and wild, like birds of Paradise, Nor pause, nor perch, hovering on untamed wing! Which meets all motion and becomes its soul, And thus, my love! as on the midway slope Full many a thought uncalled and undetained, As wild and various as the random gales And what if all of animated nature Be but organic harps diversely framed, That tremble into thought, as o'er them sweeps, But thy more serious eye a mild reproof Bubbles that glitter as they rise and break Wildered and dark, and gave me to possess Peace, and this Cot, and thee, dear honoured Maid! August 20, 1795.] SONNET. TO A FRIEND WHO ASKED, HOW I FELT WHEN THE NURSE FIRST PRESENTED MY INFANT TO ME. Charles! my slow heart was only sad, when first 60 THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER.1 IN SEVEN PARTS. Facile credo, plures esse Naturas invisibiles quam visibiles in rerum universitate. Sed horum omnium familiam quis nobis enarrabit, et gradus et cognationes et discrimina et singulorum munera? Quid agunt? quæ loca habitant? Harum rerum notitiam semper ambivit ingenium humanum, nunquam attigit. Juvat, interea, non diffiteor, quandoque in animo, tanquam in tabulâ, majoris et melioris mundi imaginem contemplari: ne mens assuefacta hodiernæ vitæ minutiis se contrahat nimis, et tota subsidat in pusillas cogitationes. Sed veritati interea invigilandum est, modusque servandus, ut certa ab incertis, diem a nocte, distinguamus. T. BURNET: "Archæol. Phil.," p. 68. Argument. How a Ship having passed the Line was driven by storms to the cold Country toward the South Pole; and how from thence she made her course to the tropical Latitude of the Great Pacific Ocean; and of the strange things that befell; and in what manner the Ancyent Marinere came back to his own Country. [1798.] An ancient Mariner meeteth three Gal lants bidden to a weddingfeast, and detaineth one. PART I. It is an ancient Mariner, And he stoppeth one of three. 'By thy long grey beard and glittering eye, Now wherefore stopp'st thou me? The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide, The guests are met, the feast is set: May'st hear the merry din.' 1 This poem formed the beginning of "Lyrical Ballads " as first printed. For its genesis see" Biographia Literaria," Chap. XIV., and the notes of Campbell's edition of "Coleridge's Poetical Works." [Macmillan.] The text here given is approximately that of the "Lyrical Ballads," edition of 1800. For the original version, 1798, with archaic spelling and many variations in the text, see Appendix E of Campbell's Coleridge. The marginal glosses were added in "Sibylline Leaves," 1817. |