V

To the young spirit present

            When first she is wed;

                  And like a bride of old

            In triumph led,

                        With music and sweet showers

                        Of festal flowers,

                  Unto the dwelling she must sway.

Well hast thou done, great artist Memory,

      In setting round thy first experiment

            With royal frame-work of wrought gold;

Needs must thou dearly love thy first essay,

And foremost in thy various gallery

      Place it, where sweetest sunlight falls

      Upon the storied walls;

                        For the discovery

And newness of thine art so pleased thee,

That all which thou hast drawn of fairest

      Or boldest since, but lightly weighs

With thee unto the love thou bearest

The first-born of thy genius. Artist-like,

Ever retiring thou dost gaze

On the prime labour of thine early days:

No matter what the sketch might be;

Whether the high field on the bushless Pike,

Or even a sand-built ridge

Of heaped hills that mound the sea,

Overblown with murmurs harsh,

Or even a lowly cottage whence we see

Stretch'd wide and wild the waste enormous marsh.

Where from the frequent bridge,

Like emblems of infinity,

The trenched waters run from sky to sky;

Or a garden bower'd close

With plaited alleys of the trailing rose,

Long alleys falling down to twilight grots,

Or opening upon level plots

Of crowned lilies, standing near

Purple-spiked lavender:

Whither in after life retired

From brawling storms,

From weary wind,

With youthful fancy reinspired.

We may hold converse with all forms

Of the many-sided mind,

And those whom passion hath not blinded,

Subtle-thoughted, myriad-minded.

My friend, with you to live alone,

Methinks were better than to own

A crown, a sceptre, and a throne.

O strengthen me, enlighten me!

I faint in this obscurity,

Thou dewy dawn of memory.