“Lyre! Though Such Power Do In Thy Magic Live”

Composed 1842 (or earlier).--Published 1842

One of the “Poems of the Imagination.”--ED.

Lyre! though such power do in thy magic live As might from India’s farthest plain Recal the not unwilling Maid, Assist me to detain The lovely Fugitive: Check with thy notes the impulse which, betrayed By her sweet farewell looks, I longed to aid. Here let me gaze enrapt upon that eye, The impregnable and awe-inspiring fort Of contemplation, the calm port By reason fenced from winds that sigh Among the restless sails of vanity. But if no wish be hers that we should part, A humbler bliss would satisfy my heart. Where all things are so fair, Enough by her dear side to breathe the air Of this Elysian weather; And, on or in, or near, the brook, espy Shade upon the sunshine lying Faint and somewhat pensively; And downward Image gaily vying With its upright living tree ’Mid silver clouds, and openings of blue sky As soft almost and deep as her cerulean eye.

Nor less the joy with many a glance Cast up the Stream or down at her beseeching, To mark its eddying foam-balls prettily distrest By ever-changing shape and want of rest; Or watch, with mutual teaching, The current as it plays In flashing leaps and stealthy creeps Adown a rocky maze; Or note (translucent summer’s happiest chance!) In the slope-channel floored with pebbles bright, Stones of all hues, gem emulous of gem, So vivid that they take from keenest sight The liquid veil that seeks not to hide them.

Compare Wordsworth’s description of the Duddon as “diaphanous, because it travels slowly,”--ED.