The Complete Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge: Poems, Plays, Essays, Lectures, Autobiography & Personal Letters (Illustrated). Samuel Taylor Coleridge

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      That crowds, and hurries, and precipitates

       With fast thick warble his delicious notes,

       As he were fearful, that an April night

       Would be too short for him to utter forth

       Hi? love-chant, and disburthen his full soul

       Of all its music! And I know a grove

       Of large extent, hard by a castle huge

       Which the great lord inhabits not: and so

       This grove is wild with tangling underwood,

       And the trim walks are broken up, and grass,

       Thin grass and king-cups grow within the paths.

       But never elsewhere in one place I knew

       So many Nightingales: and far and near

       In wood and thicket over the wide grove

       They answer and provoke each other’s songs —

       With skirmish and capricious passagings,

       And murmurs musical and swift jug jug

       And one low piping sound more sweet than all —

       Stirring the air with such an harmony,

       That should you close your eyes, you might almost

       Forget it was not day!

      A most gentle maid

       Who dwelleth in her hospitable home

       Hard by the Castle, and at latest eve,

       (Even like a Lady vow’d and dedicate

       To something more than nature in the grove)

       Glides thro’ the pathways; she knows all their notes,

       That gentle Maid! and oft, a moment’s space,

       What time the moon was lost behind a cloud,

       Hath heard a pause of silence: till the Moon

       Emerging, hath awaken’d earth and sky

       With one sensation, and those wakeful Birds

       Have all burst forth in choral minstrelsy,

       At if one quick and sudden Gale had swept

       An hundred airy harps! And she hath watch’d

       Many a Nightingale perch giddily

       On blosmy twig still swinging from the breeze,

       And to that motion tune his wanton song,

       Like tipsy Joy that reels with tossing head.

      Farewell, O Warbler! till tomorrow eve,

       And you, my friends! farewell, a short farewell!

       We have been loitering long and pleasantly,

       And now for our dear homes. — That strain again!

       Full fain it would delay me!-My dear Babe,

       Who, capable of no articulate sound,

       Mars all things with his imitative lisp,

       How he would place his hand beside his ear,

       His little hand, the small forefinger up,

       And bid us listen! And I deem it wise

       To make him Nature’s playmate. He knows well

       The evening star: and once when he awoke

       In most distressful mood (some inward pain

       Had made up that strange thing, an infant’s dream)

       I hurried with him to our orchard plot,

       And he beholds the moon, and hush’d at once

       Suspends his sobs, and laughs most silently,

       While his fair eyes that swam with undropt tears

       Did glitter in the yellow moonbeam! Well —

       It is a father’s tale. But if that Heaven

       Should give me life, his childhood shall grow up

       Familiar with these songs, that with the night

       He may associate Joy! Once more farewell,

       Sweet Nightingale! once more, my friends! farewell.

LINES WRITTEN WHEN SAILING IN A BOAT AT EVENING.

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      How rich the wave, in front, imprest

       With evening twilights summer hues,

       While, facing thus the crimson west,

       The boat her silent path pursues!

       And see how dark the backward stream!

       A little moment past, so smiling!

       And still, perhaps, with faithless gleam,

       Some other loiterer beguiling.

      Such views the youthful bard allure,

       But, heedless of the following gloom,

       He deems their colours shall endure

       ’Till peace go with him to the tomb.

       — And let him nurse his fond deceit,

       And what if he must die in sorrow!

       Who would not cherish dreams so sweet,

       Though grief and pain may come tomorrow?

LINES WRITTEN NEAR RICHMOND UPON THE THAMES.

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      Glide gently, thus for ever glide,

       O Thames! that other bards may see,

       As lovely visions by thy side

       As now, fair river! come to me.

       Oh glide, fair stream! for ever so;

       Thy quiet soul on all bestowing,

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