The complete poetical works and letters of John Keats/To a Lady seen for a Few Moments at Vauxhall
TO A LADY SEEN FOR A FEW MOMENTS AT VAUXHALL
First published in Hood's Magazine for April 1844, and afterward included in Life, Letters and Literary Remains. No date is given, and the poem is placed here from a fancied association with the lady whom Keats saw at Hastings and who started the train of thought in his letter to his brother and sister, October 25, 1818.
Time's sea hath been five years at its slow ebb,
Long hours have to and fro let creep the sand,
Since I was tangled in thy beauty's web,
And snared by the ungloving of thine hand.
And yet I never look on midnight sky,
But I behold thine eyes' well-memoried light;
I cannot look upon the rose's dye,
But to thy cheek my soul doth take its flight;
I cannot look on any budding flower,
But my fond ear, in fancy at thy lips
And hearkening for a love-sound, doth devour
Its sweets in the wrong sense:—Thou dost eclipse
Every delight with sweet remembering,
And grief unto my darling joys dost bring.