 | Poems |  |
171
SONNET.
(ON READING BUNYAN'S PILGRIM'S PROGRESS.)
A dreamy land, John Bunyan, that of thine,Now summer-bright, then dark, and wondrous wild,
Its gloom and grandeur charmed me when a child;
And even now these sober eyes of mine,
Oft see the armour of the archers shine,
Where Beelzebub his castle-walls up-piled:
Over thy pages I have wept and smiled,
Unconscious then the story was divine.
Marvellous old man! while leaning on thy gun,
Keeping a watch in England's civil wars,
Thou oft wouldst gaze upon the sinking sun,
Or map thy pilgrim's course amid the stars:
Cromwell may have heard thee murmuring like a river,
“Making thy book,”—a book to live for ever.
| Poems | |