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Who waged contention with their time's What Adonais is, why fear we to bedecay,

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That Benediction which the eclipsing Curse 480

Of birth can quench not, that sustaining Love

Which, through the web of being blindly wove

By man and beast and earth and air and sea,

Burns bright or dim, as each are mirrors of

The fire for which all thirst, now beams on me,

Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality.

The breath whose might I have invoked in song

Descends on me; my spirit's bark is driven

Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng

Whose sails were never to the tempest given;

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The massy earth and sphered skies

are riven!

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The splendor of its prime; And leave, if naught so bright may live, All earth can take or Heaven can give. 30 Saturn and Love their long repose

Shall burst, more bright and good Than all who fell, than One who rose,

Than many unsubdued:

Not gold, not blood, their altar dowers, 35 But votive tears and symbol flowers.

Oh, cease! must hate and death return?

Cease! must men kill and die?
Cease! drain not to its dregs the urn
Of bitter prophecy.

The world is weary of the past,
Oh, might it die or rest at last!

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WHEN THE LAMP IS SHATTERED

When the lamp is shattered, The light in the dust lies dead; When the cloud is scattered, The rainbow's glory is shed. When the lute is broken, Sweet tones are remembered not; When the lips have spoken,

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Loved accents are soon forgot.

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When hearts have once mingled, Love first leaves the well-built nest; The weak one is singled To endure what it once possessed.

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O Love! who bewailest The frailty of all things here, Why choose you the frailest

Now, in humbler, happier lot,
This is all remembered not;
And now, alas! the poor sprite is

For your cradle, your home, and your Imprisoned, for some fault of his, bier?

Its passions will rock thee

As the storms rock the ravens on high: Bright reason will mock thee,

Like the sun from a wintry sky.

From thy nest every rafter

Will rot, and thine eagle home
Leave thee naked to laughter,
When leaves fall and cold winds come.

WITH A GUITAR, TO JANE

Ariel to Miranda:-Take

This slave of Music, for the sake
Of him who is the slave of thee,
And teach it all the harmony
In which thou canst, and only thou,
Make the delighted spirit glow,
Till joy denies itself again,
And, too intense, is turned to pain;
For by permission and command
Of thine own Prince Ferdinand,
Poor Ariel sends this silent token
Of more than ever can be spoken;
Your guardian spirit, Ariel, who,
From life to life, must still pursue
Your happiness; for thus alone
Can Ariel ever find his own.
From Prospero's enchanted cell,
As the mighty verses tell,
To the throne of Naples, he
Lit you o'er the trackless sea,
Flitting on, your prow before,
Like a living meteor.

When you die, the silent Moon,
In her interlunar swoon,

Is not sadder in her cell
Than deserted Ariel.

When you live again on earth,
Like an unseen star of birth,
Ariel guides you o'er the sea
Of life from your nativity.

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In a body like a grave;—
From you he only dares to crave,
For his service and his sorrow,
A smile to-day, a song to-morrow.

The artist who this idol wrought,
To echo all harmonious thought,
Felled a tree, while on the steep
The woods were in their winter sleep,
Rocked in that repose divine
On the wind-swept Apennine;
And dreaming, some of Autumn past,
And some of Spring approaching fast,
And some of April buds and showers,
And some of songs in July bowers,
And all of love; and so this tree,—
Oh, that such our death may be!-
Died in sleep, and felt no pain,

To live in happier form again:

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star,

The artist wrought this loved Guitar,
And taught it justly to reply,
To all who question skilfully,
In language gentle as thine own;
Whispering in enamored tone
Sweet oracles of woods and dells,
And summer winds in sylvan cells;
For it had learned all harmonies
Of the plains and of the skies,
Of the forests and the mountains,
And the many-voiced fountains;
The clearest echoes of the hills,
The softest notes of falling rills,
The melodies of birds and bees,
The murmuring of summer seas,

And pattering rain, and breathing dew,
And airs of evening; and it knew

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Has tracked your steps, and served your By those who tempt it to betray

These secrets of an elder day:

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They alway must be with us, or we die.
Therefore, 'tis with full happiness that I
Will trace the story of Endymion.
The very music of the name has gone
Into my being, and each pleasant scene
Is growing fresh before me as the green
Of our own valleys: so I will begin
Now while I cannot hear the city's din; 40
Now while the early budders are just new,
And run in mazes of the youngest hue
About old forests; while the willow trails
Its delicate amber; and the dairy pails
Bring home increase of milk. And, as the
year

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Grows lush in juicy stalks, I'll smoothly

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