| Hunt and Lee, comps. The Book of the Sonnet. 1867. | | | | IX. Answer to a Sonnet Ending Thus | | By John Keats (1795–1821) |
| | | | “Dark eyes are dearer far |
| Than those that made the hyacinthine bell.” |
| By J. H. REYNOLDS. |
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BLUE! ’T is the life of heaven,—the domain | |
| Of Cynthia,—the wide palace of the sun,— | |
| The tent of Hesperus, and all his train,— | |
| The bosomer of clouds, gold, gray, and dun. | |
| Blue! ’T is the life of waters,—ocean, | 5 |
| And all its vassal streams: pools numberless | |
| May rage, and foam, and fret, but never can | |
| Subside, if not to dark blue nativeness. | |
| Blue! Gentle cousin of the forest green, | |
| Married to green in all the sweetest flowers, | 10 |
| Forget-me-not,—the blue-bell,—and, that queen | |
| Of secrecy, the violet; what strange powers | |
| Hast thou, as a mere shadow! But how great, | |
| When in an Eye thou art alive with fate! | | | |
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