The Annotated Milton: Complete English Poems (12 page)

Read The Annotated Milton: Complete English Poems Online

Authors: John Milton,Burton Raffel

Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Literary Collections, #Poetry, #Classics, #English; Irish; Scottish; Welsh, #English poetry

BOOK: The Annotated Milton: Complete English Poems
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And the milkmaid singeth blithe,

And the mower whets
471
his scythe,

And every shepherd tells his tale

Under the hawthorn in the dale.

Straight, mine eye hath caught new pleasures

Whilst the landscape round it measures,
472

Russet
473
lawns, and fallows
474
gray,

Where the nibbling flocks do stray,

Mountains on whose barren breast

The laboring clouds do often rest,

Meadows trim with daisies pied,
475

Shallow brooks and rivers wide.

Towers and battlements
476
it sees,

Bosomed high in tufted trees,

Where perhaps some beauty
477
lies,
478

The cynosure
479
of neighboring eyes.

Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes

From betwixt two agèd oaks,

Where Corydon and Thyrsis,
480
met,

Are at their savory dinner set

Of herbs
481
and other country messes,
482

Which the neat-handed
483
Phyllis dresses.
484

And then in haste her bow’r
485
she leaves,

With Thestylis to bind
486
the sheaves,
487

Or if the earlier season
488
lead
489

To the tanned
490
haycock
491
in the mead,
492

Sometimes with secure
493
delight

The upland
494
hamlets
495
will invite,

When the merry bells ring round,

And the jocund
496
rebecks
497
sound

To many a youth and many a maid,

Dancing in the checkered shade,

And young and old come forth to play

On a sunshine holiday,

Till the livelong daylight fail.

Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,

With stories told of many a feat,

How fairy Mab
498
the junkets
499
eat.

She was pinched and pulled, she said,

And he, by friar’s lantern led,

Tells how the drudging goblin sweat

To earn his cream-bowl, duly set,

When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,

His shadowy flail
500
hath threshed the corn
501

That ten day-laborers could not end,

Then lies him down (the lubber fend!)
502

And, stretched out all the chimney’s length,

Basks at the fire his hairy strength,

And, crop-full,
503
out of doors he flings,

Ere the first cock his matin
504
rings.

Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,

By whispering winds soon lulled asleep.

Tow’red cities please us, then,

And the busy hum of men,

Where throngs of knights and barons bold

In weeds
505
of peace high triumphs
506
hold,

With store
507
of ladies, whose bright eyes

Rain influence, and judge the prize

Of wit or arms, while both contend

To win her grace, whom all commend.

There let Hymen
508
oft appear

In saffron
509
robe, with taper
510
clear,

And pomp,
511
and feast, and revelry,

With masque and antique pageantry,

Such sights as youthful poets dream

On summer eves by haunted stream.

Then to the well-trod stage anon,

If Jonson’s
512
learnèd sock be on,
513

Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy’s
514
child,

Warble his native wood-notes wild.

And ever, against eating
515
cares,

Lap me in soft Lydian airs,
516

Married to immortal verse,

Such as the meeting
517
soul may pierce

In notes, with many a winding bout
518

Of linkèd sweetness long drawn out,

With wanton
519
heed
520
and giddy
521
cunning,
522

The melting voice through mazes running,

Untwisting all the chains that tie

The hidden soul of harmony,

That Orpheus
523
self may heave
524
his head

From golden slumber on a bed

Of heaped Elysian
525
flowers, and hear

Such strains
526
as would have won the ear

Of Pluto,
527
to have quite set free

His half-regained Eurydice.
528

These delights if thou canst give,

Mirth, with thee I mean to live.
529

 

IL PENSEROSO
530

 

1631?

 

Hence, vain deluding joys,

The brood of folly without father bred!

How little you bestead,
531

Or fill the fixèd
532
mind with all your toys!
533

Dwell in some idle brain,

And fancies fond
534
with gaudy
535
shapes possess

As thick and numberless

As the gay motes
536
that people the sun beams,

Or likest hovering dreams,

The fickle pensioners
537
of Morpheus
538
train.

But hail thou, goddess, sage and holy,

Hail divinest Melancholy,

Whose saintly visage is too bright

To hit
539
the sense of human sight

And, therefore, to our weaker view

O’er laid with black, staid wisdom’s hue—

Black, but such as in esteem

Prince Memnon’s
540
sister might beseem,
541

Or that starr’d Ethiope
542
Queen that strove

To set her beauty’s praise above

The sea nymphs, and their powers offended.

Yet thou art higher far descended,

Thee, bright-haired Vesta,
543
long of yore

To solitary Saturn bore:

His daughter she (in Saturn’s reign

Such mixture was not held a stain),

Oft in glimmering bow’rs and glades

He met her, and in secret shades

Of woody Ida’s
544
inmost grove,

While yet there was no fear of Jove.

Come, pensive nun,
545
devout and pure,

Sober, steadfast, and demure,
546

All in a robe of darkest grain,
547

Flowing with majestic train,

And sable
548
stole
549
of cypress lawn
550

Over thy decent
551
shoulders drawn!

Come, but keep thy wonted
552
state

With even step and musing gait,

And looks commercing
553
with the skies,

Thy rapt
554
soul sitting in thine eyes.

There held in holy passion still,

Forget thyself to marble, till

With a sad,
555
leaden
556
downward cast
557

Thou fix them
558
on the earth as fast.
559

And join with thee calm peace, and quiet,

Spare
560
fast,
561
that oft with gods doth diet,

And hears the Muses in a ring

Aye
562
round about Jove’s altar sing.

And add to these retired
563
leisure,

That in trim
564
gardens takes his pleasure.

But first, and chiefest, with thee bring

Him
565
that yon soars on golden wing,

Guiding the fiery-wheelèd throne,
566

The cherub Contemplation,
567

And the mute silence hist
568
along,

’Less
569
Philomel
570
will deign a song

In her sweetest, saddest plight,
571

Smoothing the rugged brow of night,

While Cynthia
572
checks
573
her dragon yoke,
574

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