Percy Bysshe Shelley

Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight.

Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.

Higher still and higher From the earth thou springest, Like a cloud of fire; The blue deep thou wingest, And singing still dost soar and soaring ever singest.

Hail to thee, blithe Spirit! Bird thou never wert, That from Heaven, or near it, Pourest thy full heart In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.

For after the rain when with never a stain The pavilion of Heaven is bare, And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams Build up the blue dome of air, I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, And out of the caverns of rain,

I am the daughter of Earth and Water, And the nursling of the Sky; I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores; I change, but I cannot die.

Rise like Lions after slumber In unvanquishable number — Shake your chains to earth like dew Which in sleep had fallen on you — Ye are many — they are few.

The old laws of England — they Whose reverend heads with age are gray, Children of a wiser day; And whose solemn voice must be Thine own echo — Liberty!

Stand ye calm and resolute, Like a forest close and mute, With folded arms and looks which are Weapons of unvanquished war.

Be your strong and simple words Keen to wound as sharpened swords, And wide as targes let them be, With their shade to cover ye.

From the haunts of daily life Where is waged the daily strife With common wants and common cares Which sows the human heart with tares.

Let the blue sky overhead, The green earth on which ye tread, All that must eternal be Witness the solemnity.

Spirit, Patience, Gentleness, All that can adorn and bless Art thou — let deeds, not words, express Thine exceeding loveliness.

What if English toil and blood Was poured forth, even as a flood? It availed, Oh, Liberty, To dim, but not extinguish thee.

Thou art Justice — ne'er for gold May thy righteous laws be sold As laws are in England — thou Shield'st alike the high and low.

What is Freedom? — ye can tell That which slavery is, too well — For its very name has grown To an echo of your own.

My father Time is weak and gray With waiting for a better day; See how idiot-like he stands, Fumbling with his palsied hands!

And with glorious triumph, they Rode through England proud and gay, Drunk as with intoxication Of the wine of desolation.

And he wore a kingly crown; And in his grasp a sceptre shone; On his brow this mark I saw —

Last came Anarchy: he rode On a white horse, splashed with blood; He was pale even to the lips, Like Death in the Apocalypse.

And many more Destructions played In this ghastly masquerade, All disguised, even to the eyes, Like Bishops, lawyers, peers, or spies.

All were fat; and well they might Be in admirable plight, For one by one, and two by two, He tossed them human hearts to chew.

I met Murder on the way — He had a mask like Castlereagh — Very smooth he looked, yet grim; Seven blood-hounds followed him.

As I lay asleep in Italy There came a voice from over the Sea, And with great power it forth led me To walk in the visions of Poesy.