A PSALM OF LIFE Tell me not, in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream! For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem. Life is real! Life is earnest! And the grave is not its goal; Dust thou art, to dust returnest, Was not spoken of the soul. [...]
MUTABILITY We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon How restlessly the speed, and gleam, and quiver Streaking the darkness radiantly yet soon Night closes round, and they lost forever Or like forgotten lyres, whose dissonant strings Give various responses to each veering blast To whose frail frame no second motion brings One mood [...]
THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH US The world is too much with us; late and soon, (a) Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: (b) Little we see in Nature that is ours; (b) We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! (a) The Sea that bares her bosom to the moon; [...]
ode to the west wind I O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being, Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing, Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou, Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed The wingèd seeds, where they [...]