YOUR PLEASURES SPRING LIKE DAISIES IN THE GRASS 1846

Your pleasures spring like daisies in the grass,

Cut down, and up again as blithe as ever; From you, Ianthe, little troubles pass Like little ripples down a sunny river.

YEARS, MANY PARTI-COLORED YEARS
1853

Years, many parti-colored years,

Some have crept on, and some have flown
Since first before me fell those tears
I never could see fall alone.

5 Years, not so many, are to come,
Years not so varied, when from you'
One more will fall: when, carried home,
I see it not, nor hear adieu.

5

10

15

20

muse shall give.

Tanagra! think not I forget

Thy beautifully-storied streets;
Be sure my memory bathes yet

In clear Thermodon, and yet greets The blithe and liberal shepherd-boy, Whose sunny bosom swells with joy When we accept his matted rushes Upheav'd with sylvan fruit; away he bounds, and blushes.

A gift I promise: one I see

Which thou with transport wilt receive,

The only proper gift for thee,

Of which no mortal shall bereave
In later times thy mouldering walls,
Until the last old turret falls;

A crown, a crown from Athens won,
A crown no God can wear, beside Latona's

son.

There may be cities who refuse

To their own child the honors due, And look ungently on the Muse; But ever shall those cities rue

The dry, unyielding, niggard breast,
Offering no nourishment, no rest,
To that young head which soon shall
rise

Disdainfully, in might and glory, to the skies.

Sweetly where cavern'd Dirce flows
Do white-arm'd maidens chant my lay,
Flapping the while with laurel-rose

The honey-gathering tribes away;
And sweetly, sweetly Attic tongues:
Lisp your Corinna's early songs;
To her with feet more graceful come
The verses that have dwelt in kindred
breasts at home.

5

10

Had plash'd the water up the farther strand.

LIFE PASSES NOT AS SOME MEN SAY

Life passes not as some men say,
If you will only urge his stay,

And treat him kindly all the while.
He flies the dizzy strife of towns,
Cowers before thunder-bearing frowns,
But freshens up again at song and smile.

Ardalia! we will place him here,
And promise that nor sigh nor tear

Shall ever trouble his repose.
What precious seal will you impress
To ratify his happiness?

That rose thro' which you breathe? Come, bring that rose.

LITTLE AGLAE

TO HER FATHER, ON HER STATUE BEING CALLED
LIKE HER

Father! the little girl we see
Is not, I fancy, so like me;
You never hold her on your knee.

When she came home, the other day,
5 You kiss'd her; but I cannot say
She kiss'd you first and ran away.

WE MIND NOT HOW THE SUN IN THE
MID-SKY

We mind not how the sun in the mid-sky
Is hastening on; but when the golden orb
Strikes the extreme of earth, and when the
gulfs

Of air and ocean open to receive him, 5 Dampness and gloom invade us; then we

think

Ah! thus is it with Youth. Too fast his feet

Run on for sight; hour follows hour; fair maid

Succeeds fair maid; bright eyes bestar his couch;

The cheerful horn awakens him; the feast, 1 The rose is an emblem of love.

We both have run o'er half the space 50 Listed for mortal's earthly race;

We both have cross'd life's fervid line,
And other stars before us shine:
May they be bright and prosperous
As those that have been stars for us!
55 Our course by Milton's light was sped,
And Shakespeare shining overhead:
Chatting on deck was Dryden too,
The Bacon of the rhyming crew;
None ever cross'd our mystic sea

60 More richly stored with thought than he; Tho' never tender nor sublime,

He wrestles with and conquers Time.

25 Together we have visited the men

Whom Pictish pirates1 vainly would have drown'd;

Ah, shall we ever clasp the hand again That gave the British harp its truest sound?

Live, Derwent's guest!2 and thou by Grasmere's springs!

30 Serene creators of immortal things.

1 Jeffrey and others, who were hostile to the
Lake School of poets-Wordsworth, Cole-
ridge, and Southey.

Southey, who lived near the river Derwent.-
Wordsworth lived near by in Grasmere.