VI.

Our life is as a circle, and our age Back to our youth returns at last in dreams; The intermediate restless pilgrimage Vexing the earth with toils, the air with schemes, Pays our hard tribute to the work-day world. That done, as some storm-shatter'd argosy Puts to the port from whence its sail unfurl'd, The soul regains the first familiar shore, And greets the quiet it disdain'd before. He who in youth from purple poetry Flush'd the grey clouds in this cold common sky, After his shadeless undelusive noon Shall mark the roseate hues, which morning wore, Herald the eve, and gird his setting sun; And the last Hesperus shine on Helicon. O long (yet nobly, since for man) resign'd Nature's most sovereign, care's most soothing boon; Again, again, with vervain fillets bind Anointed brows--O Mage supreme of song! Again before the enchanted crystal glass Let the celestial phantoms glide along-- Thou, whose sweet tears yet hallow Lycidas; Thou, who the soul of Plato didst unsphere, By chaste Sabrina's beryl-paven cell! If now no more thou deign'st to charm the ear "With measures ravish'd from Apollo's shell," Re-wake the harp which mournful willows hide Left by the captives of Jerusalem; For thou hast thought of Sion, and beside The streams of Babylon, hast wept--like them!