Fancy

   Ever let the Fancy roam,
   Pleasure never is at home:
   At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,
   Like to bubbles when rain pelteth;
   Then let winged Fancy wander
   Through the thought still spread beyond her:
   Open wide the mind's cage-door,
   She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar.
   O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
   Summer's joys are spoilt by use,
   And the enjoying of the Spring
   Fades as does its blossoming;
   Autumn's red-lipp'd fruitage too,
   Blushing through the mist and dew,
   Cloys with tasting: What do then?
   Sit thee by the ingle, when
   The sear faggot blazes bright,
   Spirit of a winter's night;
   When the soundless earth is muffled,
   And the caked snow is shuffled
   From the ploughboy's heavy shoon;
   When the Night doth meet the Noon
   In a dark conspiracy
   To banish Even from her sky.
   Sit thee there, and send abroad,
   With a mind self-overaw'd,
   Fancy, high-commission'd:--send her!
   She has vassals to attend her:
   She will bring, in spite of frost,
   Beauties that the earth hath lost;
   She will bring thee, all together,
   All delights of summer weather;
   All the buds and bells of May,
   From dewy sward or thorny spray;
   All the heaped Autumn's wealth,
   With a still, mysterious stealth:
   She will mix these pleasures up
   Like three fit wines in a cup,
   And thou shalt quaff it:--thou shalt hear
   Distant harvest-carols clear;
   Rustle of the reaped corn;
   Sweet birds antheming the morn:
   And, in the same moment, hark!
   'Tis the early April lark,
   Or the rooks, with busy caw,
   Foraging for sticks and straw.
   Thou shalt, at one glance, behold
   The daisy and the marigold;
   White-plum'd lillies, and the first
   Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst;
   Shaded hyacinth, alway
   Sapphire queen of the mid-May;
   And every leaf, and every flower
   Pearled with the self-same shower.
   Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep
   Meagre from its celled sleep;
   And the snake all winter-thin
   Cast on sunny bank its skin;
   Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see
     Hatching in the hawthorn-tree,
   When the hen-bird's wing doth rest
   Quiet on her mossy nest;
   Then the hurry and alarm
   When the bee-hive casts its swarm;
   Acorns ripe down-pattering,
   While the autumn breezes sing.

       Oh, sweet Fancy! let her loose;
   Every thing is spoilt by use:
   Where's the cheek that doth not fade,
   Too much gaz'd at? Where's the maid
   Whose lip mature is ever new?
   Where's the eye, however blue,
   Doth not weary? Where's the face
   One would meet in every place?
   Where's the voice, however soft,
   One would hear so very oft?
   At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth
   Like to bubbles when rain pelteth.
   Let, then, winged Fancy find
   Thee a mistress to thy mind:
   Dulcet-ey'd as Ceres' daughter,
   Ere the God of Torment taught her
   How to frown and how to chide;
   With a waist and with a side
   White as Hebe's, when her zone
   Slipt its golden clasp, and down
   Fell her kirtle to her feet,
   While she held the goblet sweet
   And Jove grew languid.--Break the mesh
   Of the Fancy's silken leash;
   Quickly break her prison-string
   And such joys as these she'll bring.--
   Let the winged Fancy roam,
   Pleasure never is at home.