 | The poems (1969) |  |
9 Ode to Simplicity
1
O thou by Nature taughtTo breathe her genuine thought,
In numbers warmly pure and sweetly strong:
424
In Fancy, loveliest child,
Thy babe or Pleasure's, nursed the powers of song!
2
Thou, who with hermit heartDisdain'st the wealth of art,
And gauds and pageant weeds and trailing pall:
But com'st a decent maid
In Attic robe arrayed,
O chaste unboastful nymph, to thee I call!
3
By all the honeyed store425
By all her blooms and mingled murmurs dear;
By her, whose love-lorn woe
In evening musings slow
Soothed sweetly sad Electra's poet's ear:
4
By old Cephisus deep,Who spread his wavy sweep
In warbled wanderings round thy green retreat,
On whose enamelled side
When holy Freedom died
No equal haunt allured thy future feet.
426
5
O sister meek of Truth,To my admiring youth
Thy sober aid and native charms infuse!
The flowers that sweetest breathe,
Though Beauty culled the wreath,
Still ask thy hand to range their ordered hues.
6
While Rome could none esteemBut Virtue's patriot theme,
You loved her hills and led her laureate band:
But stayed to sing alone
To one distinguished throne,
And turned thy face, and fled her altered land.
7
No more, in hall or bower,The passions own thy power,
Love, only love, her forceless numbers mean:
For thou hast left her shrine,
Nor olive more nor vine
Shall gain thy feet to bless the servile scene.
427
8
Though taste, though genius blessTo some divine excess,
Faints the cold work till thou inspire the whole;
What each, what all supply
May court, may charm our eye,
Thou, only thou can'st raise the meeting soul!
9
Of these let others askTo aid some mighty task:
I only seek to find thy temperate vale,
Where oft my reed might sound
To maids and shepherds round,
And all thy sons, O Nature, learn my tale.
| The poems (1969) | |