Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Italy: Vols. XI–XIII. 1876–79.
Written in Tasso’s House at Sorrento
By Aubrey Thomas de Vere (1814–1902)O L
Secure, ere yet thy beauty he had seen:
Here with bright face and unterrestrial mien
He walked, ere yet thy shadow he had felt.
From that green rock he watched the sunset melt,
On through the waves; yon cavern was his screen,
When first those hills, which gird the glowing scene,
Were thronged with heavenly warriors, and he knelt
To hail the vision! Siren baths to him
Were nothing; Pagan grot, or classic fane,
Or glistening pavement seen through billows dim.
Far, far o’er these he gazed on Judah’s plain;
And more than manhood wrought was in the boy,—
Why did the stranger meddle in his joy?