To stars that brushed them with their silver wings. Together with the moon I climbed the hill, And, in the very heart of Silence, heard The speech and music of immortal things.

IN ROMNEY MARSH

BY JOHN DAVIDSON

As I went down to Dymchurch Wall,
I heard the South sing o'er the land;
I saw the yellow sunlight fall

On knolls where Norman churches stand.

And ringing shrilly, taut and lithe,
Within the wind a core of sound,
The wire from Romney town to Hythe
Alone its airy journey wound.

A veil of purple vapor flowed

And trailed its fringe along the Straits;
The upper air like sapphire glowed;
The roses filled heaven's central gates.

Masts in the offing wagged their tops;
The swinging waves pealed on the shore;
The saffron beach, all diamond drops

And beads of surge, prolonged the roar.

As I came up from Dymchurch Wall,
I saw above the Down's low crest

The crimson bands of sunset fall,

Flicker and fade from out the west.

Night sank; like flashes of silver fire

The stars in one great shower came down; Shrill blew the wind; and shrill the wire Rang out from Hythe to Romney town.

The darkly shining salt sea drops

Streamed as the waves clashed on the shore;

The beach, with all its organ stops
Pealing again, prolonged the roar.

THE DAFFODILS

BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of the bay;
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee;
A poet could not but be gay

In such a jocund company;

I gazed and gazed-but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought.

For oft when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

From LINES COMPOSED A FEW MILES
ABOVE TINTERN ABBEY

BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

For I have learned

To look on nature, not as in the hour
Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes
The still, sad music of humanity,

Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man

A motion and a spirit, that impels

All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still
A lover of the meadows and the woods,

And mountains; and of all that we behold
From this green earth; of all the mighty world
Of eye, and ear,-both what they half create,
And what perceive; well pleased to recognise
In nature and the language of the sense,
The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul
Of all my moral being.

SONNET

BY JOHN KEATS

To one who has been long in city pent
'Tis very sweet to look into the fair

And open face of heaven, to breathe a prayer
Full in the smile of the blue firmament.

Who is more happy, when, with heart's content,
Fatigued he sinks into some pleasant lair
Of wavy grass, and reads a debonair
And gentle tale of love and languishment?
Returning home at evening, with an ear
Catching the notes of Philomel, an eye
Watching the sailing cloudlet's bright career,
He mourns that day so soon has glided by,
Even like the passage of an angel's tear
That falls through the clear ether silently.

THE LAKE ISLE OF INNISFREE

BY WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;

Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey

bee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;

There midnight's all a-glimmer, and noon a purple glow,

And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the

shore;

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements

gray,

I hear it in the deep heart's core.