The Complete Works of John Keats: Poems, Plays & Personal Letters. John Keats. Читать онлайн. Newlib. NEWLIB.NET

Автор: John Keats
Издательство: Bookwire
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isbn: 9788027230198
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A lamb strayed far a-down those inmost glens,

       Never again saw he the happy pens Whither his brethren, bleating with content,

       Over the hills at every nightfall went.

       Among the shepherds, ’twas believed ever,

       That not one fleecy lamb which thus did sever

       From the white flock, but pass’d unworried

       By angry wolf, or pard with prying head,

       Until it came to some unfooted plains

       Where fed the herds of Pan: ay great his gains

       Who thus one lamb did lose. Paths there were many,

       Winding through palmy fern, and rushes fenny, And ivy banks; all leading pleasantly

       To a wide lawn, whence one could only see

       Stems thronging all around between the swell

       Of turf and slanting branches: who could tell

       The freshness of the space of heaven above,

       Edg’d round with dark tree tops? through which a dove

       Would often beat its wings, and often too

       A little cloud would move across the blue.

      Full in the middle of this pleasantness

       There stood a marble altar, with a tress Of flowers budded newly; and the dew

       Had taken fairy phantasies to strew

       Daisies upon the sacred sward last eve,

       And so the dawned light in pomp receive.

       For ’twas the morn: Apollo’s upward fire

       Made every eastern cloud a silvery pyre

       Of brightness so unsullied, that therein

       A melancholy spirit well might win

       Oblivion, and melt out his essence fine

       Into the winds: rain-scented eglantine Gave temperate sweets to that well-wooing sun;

       The lark was lost in him; cold springs had run

       To warm their chilliest bubbles in the grass;

       Man’s voice was on the mountains; and the mass

       Of nature’s lives and wonders puls’d tenfold,

       To feel this sunrise and its glories old.

      Now while the silent workings of the dawn

       Were busiest, into that selfsame lawn

       All suddenly, with joyful cries, there sped

       A troop of little children garlanded; Who gathering round the altar, seemed to pry

       Earnestly round as wishing to espy

       Some folk of holiday: nor had they waited

       For many moments, ere their ears were sated

       With a faint breath of music, which ev’n then

       Fill’d out its voice, and died away again.

       Within a little space again it gave

       Its airy swellings, with a gentle wave,

       To light-hung leaves, in smoothest echoes breaking

       Through copse-clad vallies,–ere their death, o’ertaking

       The surgy murmurs of the lonely sea.

      And now, as deep into the wood as we

       Might mark a lynx’s eye, there glimmered light

       Fair faces and a rush of garments white,

       Plainer and plainer shewing, till at last

       Into the widest alley they all past,

       Making directly for the woodland altar.

       O kindly muse! let not my weak tongue faulter

       In telling of this goodly company,

       Of their old piety, and of their glee: But let a portion of ethereal dew

       Fall on my head, and presently unmew

       My soul; that I may dare, in wayfaring,

       To stammer where old Chaucer used to sing.

      Leading the way, young damsels danced along,

       Bearing the burden of a shepherd song;

       Each having a white wicker over brimm’d

       With April’s tender younglings: next, well trimm’d,

       A crowd of shepherds with as sunburnt looks

       As may be read of in Arcadian books; Such as sat listening round Apollo’s pipe,

       When the great deity, for earth too ripe,

       Let his divinity o’erflowing die

       In music, through the vales of Thessaly:

       Some idly trailed their sheep-hooks on the ground,

       And some kept up a shrilly mellow sound

       With ebon-tipped flutes: close after these,

       Now coming from beneath the forest trees,

       A venerable priest full soberly,

       Begirt with ministring looks: alway his eye Stedfast upon the matted turf he kept,

       And after him his sacred vestments swept.

       From his right hand there swung a vase, milk-white,

       Of mingled wine, out-sparkling generous light;

       And in his left he held a basket full

       Of all sweet herbs that searching eye could cull:

       Wild thyme, and valley-lilies whiter still

       Than Leda’s love, and cresses from the rill.

       His aged head, crowned with beechen wreath,

       Seem’d like a poll of ivy in the teeth Of winter hoar. Then came another crowd

       Of shepherds, lifting in due time aloud

       Their share of the ditty. After them appear’d,

       Upfollowed by a multitude that rear’d

       Their voices to the clouds, a fair wrought car,

       Easily rolling so as scarce to mar

       The freedom of three steeds of dapple brown:

       Who stood therein did seem of great renown

       Among the throng. His youth was fully blown,

       Shewing like Ganymede to manhood grown; And, for those simple times, his garments were

       A chieftain king’s: beneath his breast, half bare,

       Was hung a silver bugle, and between

       His nervy knees there lay a boar-spear keen.

       A smile was on his countenance; he seem’d,

       To common lookers on, like one who dream’d

       Of idleness in groves Elysian:

       But there were some who feelingly could scan

       A lurking trouble in his nether lip,

       And see that oftentimes the reins would slip Through his forgotten hands: then would they sigh,

       And think of yellow leaves, of owlets cry,

       Of logs piled solemnly.–Ah, well-a-day,

       Why should our young Endymion pine away!

      Soon the assembly, in a circle rang’d,

       Stood silent round the shrine: each look was chang’d

       To sudden veneration: women meek

       Beckon’d their sons to silence; while each cheek

       Of virgin bloom paled gently for slight fear.