| (i) |
| Strange fits of passion have I known : |
| And I will dare to tell, |
| But in the Lover’s ear alone, |
What once to me befell.
|
| When she I loved looked every day |
| Fresh as a rose in June, |
| I to her cottage bent my way, |
Beneath an evening-moon.
|
| Upon the moon I fixed my eye, |
| All over the wide lea ; |
| With quickening pace my horse drew nigh |
Those paths so dear to me.
|
| And now we reached the orchard-plot ; |
| And, as we climbed the hill, |
| The sinking moon to Lucy’s cot |
Came near, and nearer still.
|
| In one of those sweet dreams I slept, |
| Kind Nature’s gentlest boon ! |
| And all the while my eyes I kept |
On the descending moon.
|
| My horse moved on ; hoof after hoof |
| He raised, and never stopped : |
| When down behind the cottage roof, |
At once, the bright moon dropped.
|
| What fond and wayward thoughts will
slide |
| Into a Lover’s head ! |
| ‘O mercy !’ to myself I cried, |
‘If Lucy should be dead !’
|
| (ii) |
| She dwelt among the untrodden ways |
| Beside the springs of Dove, |
| A Maid whom there were none to praise |
And very few to love :
|
| A violet by a mossy stone |
| Half hidden from the eye ! |
| – Fair as a star, when only one |
Is shining in the sky.
|
| She lived unknown, and few could know |
| When Lucy ceased to be ; |
| But she is in her grave, and, oh, |
The difference to me !
|
| (iii) |
| I travelled among unknown men, |
| In lands beyond the sea ; |
| Nor, England ! did I know till then |
What love I bore to thee.
|
| ’Tis past, that melancholy dream ! |
| Nor will I quit thy shore |
| A second time ; for still I seem |
To love thee more and more.
|
| Among thy mountains did I feel |
| The joy of my desire ; |
| And she I cherished turned her wheel |
Beside an English fire.
|
| Thy mornings showed, thy nights
concealed, |
| The bowers where Lucy played ; |
| And thine too is the last green field
|
That Lucy’s eyes surveyed.
|
| (iv) |
| Three years she grew in sun and shower, |
| Then Nature said, ‘A lovelier flower |
| On earth was never sown ; |
| This Child I to myself will take ; |
| She shall be mine, and I will make |
A lady of my own.
|
| ‘Myself will to my darling be |
| Both law and impulse : and with me |
| The Girl, in rock and plain, |
| In earth and heaven, in glade and
bower, |
| Shall feel an overseeing power |
To kindle or restrain.
|
| ‘She shall be sportive as the fawn |
| That wild with glee across the lawn |
| Or up the mountain springs ; |
| And hers shall be the breathing balm, |
| And hers the silence and the calm |
Of mute insensate things.
|
| ‘The floating clouds their state shall
lend |
| To her ; for her the willow bend ; |
| Nor shall she fail to see |
| Even in the motions of the Storm |
| Grace that shall mould the Maiden’s
form |
By silent sympathy.
|
| ‘The stars of midnight shall be dear |
| To her ; and she shall lean her ear |
| In many a secret place |
| Where rivulets dance their wayward
round, |
| And beauty born of murmuring sound |
Shall pass into her face.
|
| ‘And vital feelings of delight |
| Shall rear her form to stately height, |
| Her virgin bosom swell ; |
| Such thoughts to Lucy I will give |
| While she and I together live |
Here in this happy dell.’
|
| Thus Nature spake – The work was done – |
| How soon my Lucy’s race was run ! |
| She died, and left to me |
| This heath, this calm, and quiet scene
; |
| The memory of what has been, |
And never more will be.
|
| (v) |
| A slumber did my spirit seal ; |
| I had no human fears : |
| She seemed a thing that could not feel |
The touch of earthly years.
|
| No motion has she now, no force ; |
| She neither hears nor sees ; |
| Rolled round in earth’s diurnal course, |
With rocks, and stones, and trees.
|
| William
Wordsworth |
Classic Poems |
| |
|
[ Composed Upon Westminster Bridge September 3 ] [ Daffodils ] [ The Prelude ] [ Lucy ] [ Intimations of immortality ] [ The Solitary Reaper ] [ The world is too much with us ] [ My heart leaps up when I behold ] [ Milton ] [ Extempore Effusion upon the Death of James Hogg ] |
