Poems, Dialogues in Verse and Epigrams By Walter Savage Landor: Edited with notes by Charles G. Crump |
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 | Poems, Dialogues in Verse and Epigrams |  |
LX. WRITTEN AT HURSTMONCEAUX.
ON READING A POEM OF WORDSWORTH'S.
Derwent! Winander! sweetest of all soundsThe British tongue e'er utter'd! lakes that Heaven
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In all its purity, in all its peace!
How are your ripples playing round my heart
From such a distance? while I gaze upon
The plain where William and where Cæsar led
From the same Gaulish strand each conquering host,
And one on the Briton, one the Saxon name,
Struck out with iron heel. Well may they play,
Those ripples, round my heart, buoyed up, entranced.
Derwent! Winander! your twin poets come
Star-crown'd along with you, nor stand apart.
Wordsworth comes hither, hither Southey comes,
His friend and mine, and every man's who lives,
Or who shall live when days far off have risen.
Here are they with me yet again, here dwell
Among the sages of Antiquity,
Under his hospitable roof whose life
Surpasses theirs in strong activity,
Whose Genius walks more humbly, stooping down
From the same highth to cheer the weak of soul
And guide the erring from the tortuous way.
Hail ye departed! hail thou later friend,
Julius! but never by my voice invoked
With such an invocation . . hail, and live!
| Poems, Dialogues in Verse and Epigrams | |