| |
| HAIL to thee, blithe Spirit! | |
| Bird thou never wert, | |
| That from heaven, or near it, | |
| Pourest thy full heart | |
| In profuse strains of unpremeditated art | 5 |
| |
| Higher still and higher | |
| From the earth thou springest | |
| Like a cloud of fire; | |
| The blue deep thou wingest, | |
| And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest. | 10 |
| |
| In the golden lightning | |
| Of the sunken sun | |
| O’er which clouds are brightening, | |
| Thou dost float and run, | |
| Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun. | 15 |
| |
| The pale purple even | |
| Melts around thy flight; | |
| Like a star of heaven | |
| In the broad daylight | |
| Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight: | 20 |
| |
| Keen as are the arrows | |
| Of that silver sphere, | |
| Whose intense lamp narrows | |
| In the white dawn clear | |
| Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there. | 25 |
| |
| All the earth and air | |
| With thy voice is loud, | |
| As, when night is bare, | |
| From one lonely cloud | |
| The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is overflow’d. | 30 |
| |
| What thou art we know not; | |
| What is most like thee? | |
| From rainbow clouds there flow not | |
| Drops so bright to see | |
| As from thy presence showers a rain of melody. | 35 |
| |
| Like a poet hidden | |
| In the light of thought, | |
| Singing hymns unbidden, | |
| Till the world is wrought | |
| To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not: | 40 |
| |
| Like a high-born maiden | |
| In a palace tower, | |
| Soothing her love-laden | |
| Soul in secret hour | |
| With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower: | 45 |
| |
| Like a glow-worm golden | |
| In a dell of dew, | |
| Scattering unbeholden | |
| Its aerial hue | |
| Among the flowers and grass, which screen it from the view: | 50 |
| |
| Like a rose embower’d | |
| In its own green leaves, | |
| By warm winds deflower’d, | |
| Till the scent it gives | |
| Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-winged thieves. | 55 |
| |
| Sound of vernal showers | |
| On the twinkling grass, | |
| Rain-awaken’d flowers, | |
| All that ever was | |
| Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass. | 60 |
| |
| Teach us, sprite or bird, | |
| What sweet thoughts are thine: | |
| I have never heard | |
| Praise of love or wine | |
| That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine. | 65 |
| |
| Chorus hymeneal | |
| Or triumphal chaunt | |
| Match’d with thine, would be all | |
| But an empty vaunt— | |
| A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want. | 70 |
| |
| What objects are the fountains | |
| Of thy happy strain? | |
| What fields, or waves, or mountains? | |
| What shapes of sky or plain? | |
| What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain? | 75 |
| |
| With thy clear keen joyance | |
| Languor cannot be: | |
| Shadow of annoyance | |
| Never came near thee: | |
| Thou lovest; but ne’er knew love’s sad satiety. | 80 |
| |
| Waking or asleep | |
| Thou of death must deem | |
| Things more true and deep | |
| Than we mortals dream, | |
| Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream? | 85 |
| |
| We look before and after, | |
| And pine for what is not: | |
| Our sincerest laughter | |
| With some pain is fraught; | |
| Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought. | 90 |
| |
| Yet if we could scorn | |
| Hate, and pride, and fear; | |
| If we were things born | |
| Not to shed a tear, | |
| I know not how thy joy we ever should come near. | 95 |
| |
| Better than all measures | |
| Of delightful sound, | |
| Better than all treasures | |
| That in books are found, | |
| Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground! | 100 |
| |
| Teach me half the gladness | |
| That thy brain must know, | |
| Such harmonious madness | |
| From my lips would flow | |
| The world should listen then, as I am listening now! | 105 |
| |
