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(From Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage)
THE CASTLED crag of Drachenfels | |
| Frowns o’er the wide and winding Rhine, | |
| Whose breast of waters broadly swells | |
| Between the banks which bear the vine, | |
| And hills all rich with blossomed trees, | 5 |
| And fields which promise corn and wine, | |
| And scattered cities crowning these, | |
| Whose far white walls along them shine, | |
| Have strewed a scene, which I should see | |
| With double joy wert thou with me. | 10 |
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| And peasant-girls, with deep-blue eyes, | |
| And hands which offer early flowers, | |
| Walk smiling o’er this paradise; | |
| Above, the frequent feudal towers | |
| Through green leaves lift their walls of gray, | 15 |
| And many a rock which steeply lowers, | |
| And noble arch in proud decay, | |
| Look o’er this vale of vintage bowers; | |
| But one thing want these banks of Rhine,— | |
| Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine! | 20 |
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| I send the lilies given to me; | |
| Though long before thy hand they touch | |
| I know that they must withered be, | |
| But yet reject them not as such; | |
| For I have cherished them as dear, | 25 |
| Because they yet may meet thine eye, | |
| And guide thy soul to mine even here, | |
| When thou behold’st them drooping nigh, | |
| And know’st them gathered by the Rhine, | |
| And offered from my heart to thine! | 30 |
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| The river nobly foams and flows, | |
| The charm of this enchanted ground, | |
| And all its thousand turns disclose | |
| Some fresher beauty varying round: | |
| The haughtiest breast its wish might bound | 35 |
| Through life to dwell delighted here; | |
| Nor could on earth a spot be found | |
| To nature and to me so dear, | |
| Could thy dear eyes in following mine | |
| Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine! | 40 |
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