Page:Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918.djvu/785

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JOHN KEATS

Bards of Passion and of Mirth, Ye have left your souls on earth! Ye have souls in heaven too, Double-lived in regions new!

��63 8 Fancy

EV^ER let the Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home. At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth, Like to bubbles when rain pelteth; Then let winged Fancy wander Through the thought still spread beyond her. Open wide the mind's cage-door, She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar. O sweet Fancy 1 let her loose, Summer's joys are spoilt by use, And the enjoying of the Spring Fades as does its blossoming Autumn's red-hpp'd fruitage too, Blushing through the mist and dew, Cloys with tasting What do then? Sit thee by the ingle, when The sear faggot blazes bright, Spirit of a winter's night, When the soundless earth is muffled, And the caked snow is shuffled From the ploughboy's heavy shoon; When the Night doth meet the Noon In a dark conspiracy To banish Even from her sky.

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