The Giant Book of Poetry Read online

  it had been strange, even in a dream,

  to have seen those dead men rise.

  The helmsman steered, the ship moved on;

  yet never a breeze up-blew;

  the mariners all ’gan work the ropes,

  where they were wont to do;

  they raised their limbs like lifeless tools—

  we were a ghastly crew.

  The body of my brother’s son

  stood by me, knee to knee:

  the body and I pulled at one rope,

  but he said nought to me.

  “I fear thee, ancient Mariner!’

  Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest!

  ‘Twas not those souls that fled in pain,

  which to their corses came again,

  but a troop of spirits blest:

  for when it dawned—they dropped their arms,

  and clustered round the mast;

  sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths,

  and from their bodies passed.

  Around, around, flew each sweet sound,

  then darted to the Sun;

  slowly the sounds came back again,

  now mixed, now one by one.

  Sometimes a-dropping from the sky

  I heard the sky-lark sing;

  sometimes all little birds that are,

  how they seemed to fill the sea and air

  with their sweet jargoning!

  And now ’twas like all instruments,

  now like a lonely flute;

  and now it is an angel’s song, that makes the heavens be mute.

  It ceased; yet still the sails made on

  a pleasant noise till noon,

  a noise like of a hidden brook

  in the leafy month of June,

  that to the sleeping woods all night

  singeth a Quiet tune.

  Till noon we quietly sailed on,

  yet never a breeze did breathe:

  slowly and smoothly went the ship,

  moved onward from beneath.

  Under the keel nine fathom deep,

  from the land of mist and snow,

  the spirit slid: and it was he

  that made the ship to go.

  The sails at noon left off their tune,

  and the ship stood still also.

  The Sun, right up above the mast,

  had fixed her to the ocean:

  but in a minute she ’gan stir,

  with a short uneasy motion—

  backwards and forwards half her length

  with a short uneasy motion.

  Then like a pawing horse let go,

  she made a sudden bound:

  it flung the blood into my head,

  and I fell down in a swound.

  How long in that same fit I lay,

  I have not to declare;

  but ere my living life returned,

  I heard and in my soul discerned

  two voices in the air.

  ‘Is it he?’ quoth one, ‘Is this the man?

  by him who died on cross,

  with his cruel bow he laid full low

  the harmless Albatross.

  The spirit who bideth by himself

  in the land of mist and snow,

  he loved the bird that loved the man

  who shot him with his bow.’

  The other was a softer voice,

  as soft as honey-dew:

  quoth he, ‘The man hath penance done,

  and penance more will do.’

  PART VI

  FIRST VOICE

  ‘But tell me, tell me! speak again,

  thy soft response renewing—

  what makes that ship drive on so fast?

  What is the ocean doing?’

  SECOND VOICE

  ‘Still as a slave before his lord,

  the ocean hath no blast;

  his great bright eye most silently

  up to the Moon is cast—

  if he may know which way to go;

  for she guides him smooth or grim.

  See, brother, see! how graciously

  she looketh down on him.’

  FIRST VOICE

  ‘But why drives on that ship so fast,

  without or wave or wind?’

  SECOND VOICE

  ‘The air is cut away before,

  and closes from behind.

  Fly, brother, fly! more high, more high!

  Or we shall be belated:

  for slow and slow that ship will go,

  when the Mariner’s trance is abated.’

  I woke, and we were sailing on

  as in a gentle weather:

  ‘twas night, calm night, the moon was high;

  the dead men stood together.

  All stood together on the deck,

  for a charnel-dungeon fitter:

  all fixed on me their stony eyes,

  that in the Moon did glitter.

  The pang, the curse, with which they died,

  had never passed away:

  I could not draw my eyes from theirs,

  nor turn them up to pray.

  And now this spell was snapt: once more

  I viewed the ocean green,

  and looked far forth, yet little saw

  of what had else been seen—

  like one, that on a lonesome road

  doth walk in fear and dread,

  and having once turned round walks on,

  and turns no more his head;

  because he knows, a frightful fiend

  doth close behind him tread.

  But soon there breathed a wind on me,

  nor sound nor motion made:

  its path was not upon the sea,

  in ripple or in shade.

  It raised my hair, it fanned my cheek

  like a meadow-gale of spring—

  it mingled strangely with my fears,

  yet it felt like a welcoming.

  Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship,

  yet she sailed softly too:

  sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze—

  on me alone it blew.

  Oh! dream of joy! is this indeed

  the light-house top I see?

  Is this the hill? is this the kirk?

  Is this mine own country?

  We drifted o’er the harbor-bar,

  and I with sobs did pray—

  O let me be awake, my God!

  or let me sleep alway.

  The harbor-bay was clear as glass,

  so smoothly it was strewn!

  And on the bay the moonlight lay,

  and the shadow of the Moon.

  The rock shone bright, the kirk no less,

  that stands above the rock:

  the moonlight steeped in silentness

  the steady weathercock.

  And the bay was white with silent light,

  till rising from the same,

  full many shapes, that shadows were,

  in crimson colors came.

  A little distance from the prow

  those crimson shadows were:

  I turned my eyes upon the deck—

  oh, Christ! what saw I there!

  Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat,

  and, by the holy rood!

  A man all light, a seraph-man,

  on every corse there stood.

  This seraph-band, each waved his hand:

  it was a heavenly sight!

  They stood as signals to the land,

  each one a lovely light;

  this seraph-band, each waved his hand,

  no voice did they impart—

  no voice; but oh! the silence sank

  like music on my heart.

  But soon I heard the dash of oars,

  I heard the Pilot’s cheer;

  my head was turned perforce away

  and I saw a boat appear.

  The Pilot and the Pilot’s boy,

  I heard them coming fast:

  dear Lord in Heaven! it was a joy
<
br />   the dead men could not blast.

  I saw a third—I heard his voice:

  it is the Hermit good!

  He singeth loud his godly hymns

  that he makes in the wood.

  He’ll shrieve my soul, he’ll wash away

  the Albatross’s blood.

  PART VII

  This Hermit good lives in that wood

  which slopes down to the sea.

  How loudly his sweet voice he rears!

  He loves to talk with mariners

  that come from a far country.

  He kneels at morn, and noon, and eve—

  he hath a cushion plump:

  it is the moss that wholly hides

  the rotted old oak-stump.

  The skiff-boat neared: I heard them talk,

  ‘Why, this is strange, I trow!

  where are those lights so many and fair,

  that signal made but now?’

  ‘Strange, by my faith!’ the Hermit said—

  ‘and they answered not our cheer!

  the planks looked warped! and see those sails,

  how thin they are and sere!

  I never saw aught like to them,

  unless perchance it were

  brown skeletons of leaves that lag

  my forest-brook along;

  when the ivy-tod is heavy with snow,

  and the owlet whoops to the wolf below,

  that eats the she-wolf’s young.’

  ’Dear Lord! it hath a fiendish look—

  (the Pilot made reply)

  I am a-feared’—‘Push on,

  push on!’

  said the Hermit cheerily.

  The boat came closer to the ship,

  but I nor spake nor stirred;

  the boat came close beneath the ship,

  and straight a sound was heard.

  Under the water it rumbled on,

  still louder and more dread:

  it reached the ship, it split the bay;

  the ship went down like lead.

  Stunned by that loud and dreadful sound,

  which sky and ocean smote,

  like one that hath been seven days drowned my body lay afloat;

  but swift as dreams, myself I found

  within the Pilot’s boat.

  Upon the whirl, where sank the ship,

  the boat spun round and round;

  and all was still, save that the hill

  was telling of the sound.

  I moved my lips—the Pilot shrieked

  and fell down in a fit;

  the holy Hermit raised his eyes,

  and prayed where he did sit.

  I took the oars: the Pilot’s boy,

  who now doth crazy go,

  laughed loud and long, and all the while

  his eyes went to and fro.

  ‘Ha! ha!’ quoth he, ‘full plain I see,

  the Devil knows how to row.’

  And now, all in my own country,

  I stood on the firm land!

  The Hermit stepped forth from the boat,

  and scarcely he could stand.

  ’O shrieve me, shrieve me, holy man!’

  The Hermit crossed his brow.

  ‘Say quick,’ quoth he, ‘I bid thee say—

  what manner of man art thou?’

  Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched

  with a woeful agony,

  which forced me to begin my tale;

  and then it left me free.

  Since then, at an uncertain hour,

  that agony returns:

  and till my ghastly tale is told,

  this heart within me burns.

  I pass, like night, from land to land;

  I have strange power of speech;

  that moment that his face I see,

  I know the man that must hear me:

  to him my tale I teach.

  What loud uproar bursts from that door!

  The wedding-guests are there:

  but in the garden-bower the bride

  and bride-maids singing are:

  and hark the little vesper bell,

  which biddeth me to prayer!

  O Wedding-Guest! this soul hath been

  alone on a wide wide sea:

  so lonely ’twas, that God himself

  scarce seemëd there to be.

  O sweeter than the marriage-feast,

  ‘tis sweeter far to me,

  to walk together to the kirk

  with a goodly company!—

  To walk together to the kirk,

  and all together pray,

  while each to his great Father bends,

  old men, and babes, and loving friends

  and youths and maidens gay!

  Farewell, farewell! but this I tell

  to thee, thou Wedding-Guest!

  He prayeth well, who loveth well

  both man and bird and beast.

  He prayeth best, who loveth best

  all things both great and small;

  for the dear God who loveth us,

  he made and loveth all.

  The Mariner, whose eye is bright,

  whose beard with age is hoar,

  is gone: and now the Wedding-Guest

  turned from the bridegroom’s door.

  He went like one that hath been stunned,

  and is of sense forlorn:

  a sadder and a wiser man,

  he rose the morrow morn.

  Robert Southey (1774 – 1843)

  After Blenheim1

  It was a summer evening,

  old Kaspar’s work was done,

  and he before his cottage door

  was sitting in the sun;

  and by him sported on the green

  his little grandchild Wilhelmine.

  She saw her brother Peterkin

  roll something large and round

  which he beside the rivulet

  in playing there had found;

  he came to ask what he had found

  that was so large and smooth and round.

  Old Kaspar took it from the boy,

  who stood expectant by;

  and then the old man shook his head,

  and with a natural sigh,

  “‘Tis some poor fellow’s skull,” said he,

  “who fell in the great victory.”

  “I find them in the garden,

  for there’s many here about;

  and often, when I go to plough,

  the ploughshare turns them out;

  for many thousand men,” said he,

  “were slain in that great victory.”

  “Now tell us what ’twas all about,”

  young Peterkin he cries;

  and little Wilhelmine looks up

  with wonder-waiting eyes;

  “Now tell us all about the war,

  and what they fought each other for.”

  “It was the English,” Kaspar cried,

  “who put the French to rout;

  but what they fought each other for

  I could not well make out.

  But everybody said,” quoth he,

  “that ’twas a famous victory.

  My father lived at Blenheim then,

  yon little stream hard by;

  they burnt his dwelling to the ground,

  and he was forced to fly:

  so with his wife and child he fled,

  nor had he where to rest his head.

  With fire and sword the country round

  was wasted far and wide,

  and many a childing mother then

  and newborn baby died;

  but things like that, you know, must be

  at every famous victory.

  They say it was a shocking sight

  after the field was won;

  for many thousand bodies here

  lay rotting in the sun;

  but things like that, you know, must be

  after a famous victory.

  Grea
t praise the Duke of Marlbro’ won,

  and our good Prince Eugene.

  “Why, ’twas a very wicked thing!”

  said little Wilhelmine.

  “Nay…nay… my little girl,” Quoth he,

  “it was a famous victory.

  And everybody praised the Duke

  who this great fight did win.”

  “But what good came of it at last?”

  Quoth little Peterkin.

  “Why that I cannot tell,” said he,

  “but ’twas a famous victory.”

  The Scholar1

  My days among the Dead are past;

  around me I behold,

  where’er these casual eyes are cast,

  the mighty minds of old:

  my never-failing friends are they,

  with whom I converse day by day.

  With them I take delight in weal

  and seek relief in woe;

  and while I understand and feel

  how much to them I owe,

  my cheeks have often been bedewed

  with tears of thoughtful gratitude.

  My thoughts are with the Dead; with them

  I live in long-past years,

  their virtues love, their faults condemn,

  partake their hopes and fears,

  and from their lessons seek and find

  instruction with an humble mind.

  My hopes are with the Dead; anon

  my place with them will be,

  and I with them shall travel on

  through all Futurity;

  yet leaving here a name, I trust,

  that will not perish in the dust.

  Walter Savage Landor (1775 – 1864)

  On His Seventy-Fifth Birthday1

  I strove with none; for none was worth my strife;

  nature I loved, and next to Nature, Art;

  I warmed both hands before the fire of life;

  it sinks, and I am ready to depart.

  Well I Remember2

  Well I remember how you smiled

  to see me write your name upon

  the soft sea-sand … “O! what a child!

  You think you’re writing upon stone/!

  I have since written what no tide

  shall ever wash away, what men

  unborn shall read o’er ocean wide