Romance

  Romance, who loves to nod and sing,
  With drowsy head and folded wing,
  Among the green leaves as they shake
  Far down within some shadowy lake,
  To me a painted paroquet
  Hath been--a most familiar bird--
  Taught me my alphabet to say--
  To lisp my very earliest word
  While in the wild wood I did lie,
  A child--with a most knowing eye.
  Of late, eternal Condor years
  So shake the very Heaven on high
  With tumult as they thunder by,
  I have no time for idle cares
  Though gazing on the unquiet sky.
  And when an hour with calmer wings
  Its down upon my spirit flings--
  That little time with lyre and rhyme
  To while away--forbidden things!
  My heart would feel to be a crime
  Unless it trembled with the strings.

1829.