Endymion

ENDYMION:

A Poetic Romance.

BY JOHN KEATS.

"THE STRETCHED METRE OF AN ANTIQUE SONG."

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR TAYLOR AND HESSEY,

93, FLEET STREET.

1818.

INSCRIBED TO THE MEMORY OF THOMAS CHATTERTON.

PREFACE.

Knowing within myself the manner in which this Poem has been

produced, it is not without a feeling of regret that I make it

public.

What manner I mean, will be quite clear to the reader, who must soon

perceive great inexperience, immaturity, and every error denoting a

feverish attempt, rather than a deed accomplished. The two first

books, and indeed the two last, I feel sensible are not of such

completion as to warrant their passing the press; nor should they if

I thought a year's castigation would do them any good;--it will not:

the foundations are too sandy. It is just that this youngster should

die away: a sad thought for me, if I had not some hope that while it

is dwindling I may be plotting, and fitting myself for verses fit to

live.

This may be speaking too presumptuously, and may deserve a

punishment: but no feeling man will be forward to inflict it: he will

leave me alone, with the conviction that there is not a fiercer hell

than the failure in a great object. This is not written with the

least atom of purpose to forestall criticisms of course, but from the

desire I have to conciliate men who are competent to look, and who do

look with a zealous eye, to the honour of English literature.

The imagination of a boy is healthy, and the mature imagination of a

man is healthy; but there is a space of life between, in which the

soul is in a ferment, the character undecided, the way of life

uncertain, the ambition thick-sighted: thence proceeds mawkishness,

and all the thousand bitters which those men I speak of must

necessarily taste in going over the following pages.

I hope I have not in too late a day touched the beautiful mythology

of Greece, and dulled its brightness: for I wish to try once more,

before I bid it farewel.

_Teignmouth,

April 10, 1818._

ERRATUM.

Page 108, line 4 from the bottom, for "her" read "his."

ENDYMION.

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:

Its loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness; but still will keep

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing

A flowery band to bind us to the earth,

Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth

Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,

Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkened ways 10

Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,

Some shape of beauty moves away the pall

From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,

Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon

For simple sheep; and such are daffodils

With the green world they live in; and clear rills

That for themselves a cooling covert make

'Gainst the hot season; the mid forest brake,

Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:

And such too is the grandeur of the dooms 20

We have imagined for the mighty dead;

All lovely tales that we have heard or read:

An endless fountain of immortal drink,

Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink.

Nor do we merely feel these essences

For one short hour; no, even as the trees

That whisper round a temple become soon

Dear as the temple's self, so does the moon,

The passion poesy, glories infinite,

Haunt us till they become a cheering light 30

Unto our souls, and bound to us so fast,

That, whether there be shine, or gloom o'ercast,

They alway must be with us, or we die.

Therefore, 'tis with full happiness that I

Will trace the story of Endymion.

The very music of the name has gone

Into my being, and each pleasant scene

Is growing fresh before me as the green

Of our own vallies: so I will begin

Now while I cannot hear the city's din; 40

Now while the early budders are just new,

And run in mazes of the youngest hue

About old forests; while the willow trails

Its delicate amber; and the dairy pails

Bring home increase of milk. And, as the year

Grows lush in juicy stalks, I'll smoothly steer

My little boat, for many quiet hours,

With streams that deepen freshly into bowers.

Many and many a verse I hope to write,

Before the daisies, vermeil rimm'd and white, 50

Hide in deep herbage; and ere yet the bees

Hum about globes of clover and sweet peas,

I must be near the middle of my story.

O may no wintry season, bare and hoary,

See it half finished: but let Autumn bold,

With universal tinge of sober gold,

Be all about me when I make an end.

And now at once, adventuresome, I send

My herald thought into a wilderness:

There let its trumpet blow, and quickly dress 60

My uncertain path with green, that I may speed

Easily onward, thorough flowers and weed.

Upon the sides of Latmos was outspread

A mighty forest; for the moist earth fed

So plenteously all weed-hidden roots

Into o'er-hanging boughs, and precious fruits.

And it had gloomy shades, sequestered deep,

Where no man went; and if from shepherd's keep

A lamb strayed far a-down those inmost glens,

Never again saw he the happy pens 70

Whither his brethren, bleating with content,

Over the hills at every nightfall went.

Among the shepherds, 'twas believed ever,

That not one fleecy lamb which thus did sever

From the white flock, but pass'd unworried

By angry wolf, or pard with prying head,

Until it came to some unfooted plains

Where fed the herds of Pan: ay great his gains

Who thus one lamb did lose. Paths there were many,

Winding through palmy fern, and rushes fenny, 80

And ivy banks; all leading pleasantly

To a wide lawn, whence one could only see

Stems thronging all around between the swell

Of turf and slanting branches: who could tell

O sovereign power of love! O grief! O balm!

All records, saving thine, come cool, and calm,

And shadowy, through the mist of passed years:

For others, good or bad, hatred and tears

Have become indolent; but touching thine,

One sigh doth echo, one poor sob doth pine,

One kiss brings honey-dew from buried days.

The woes of Troy, towers smothering o'er their blaze,

Stiff-holden shields, far-piercing spears, keen blades,

Struggling, and blood, and shrieks--all dimly fades 10

Into some backward corner of the brain;

Yet, in our very souls, we feel amain

The close of Troilus and Cressid sweet.

Hence, pageant history! hence, gilded cheat!

Swart planet in the universe of deeds!

Wide sea, that one continuous murmur breeds

Along the pebbled shore of memory!

Many old rotten-timber'd boats there be

Upon thy vaporous bosom, magnified

To goodly vessels; many a sail of pride, 20

And golden keel'd, is left unlaunch'd and dry.

But wherefore this? What care, though owl did fly

About the great Athenian admiral's mast?

What care, though striding Alexander past

The Indus with his Macedonian numbers?

Though old Ulysses tortured from his slumbers

The glutted Cyclops, what care?--Juliet leaning

Amid her window-flowers,--sighing,--weaning

Tenderly her fancy from its maiden snow,

Doth more avail than these: the silver flow 30

Of Hero's tears, the swoon of Imogen,

Fair Pastorella in the bandit's den,

Are things to brood on with more ardency

Than the death-day of empires. Fearfully

Must such conviction come upon his head,

Who, thus far, discontent, has dared to tread,

Without one muse's smile, or kind behest,

The path of love and poesy. But rest,

In chaffing restlessness, is yet more drear

Than to be crush'd, in striving to uprear 40

Love's standard on the battlements of song.

So once more days and nights aid me along,

Like legion'd soldiers.

Brain-sick shepherd prince,

What promise hast thou faithful guarded since

The day of sacrifice? Or, have new sorrows

Come with the constant dawn upon thy morrows?

Alas! 'tis his old grief. For many days,

Has he been wandering in uncertain ways:

Through wilderness, and woods of mossed oaks; 50

Counting his woe-worn minutes, by the strokes

Of the lone woodcutter; and listening still,

Hour after hour, to each lush-leav'd rill.

Now he is sitting by a shady spring,

And elbow-deep with feverous fingering

Stems the upbursting cold: a wild rose tree

Pavilions him in bloom, and he doth see

A bud which snares his fancy: lo! but now

He plucks it, dips its stalk in the water: how!

It swells, it buds, it flowers beneath his sight; 60

And, in the middle, there is softly pight

A golden butterfly; upon whose wings

There must be surely character'd strange things,

For with wide eye he wonders, and smiles oft.

Lightly this little herald flew aloft,

Follow'd by glad Endymion's clasped hands:

Onward it flies. From languor's sullen bands

His limbs are loos'd, and eager, on he hies

Dazzled to trace it in the sunny skies.

It seem'd he flew, the way so easy was; 70

And like a new-born spirit did he pass

Through the green evening quiet in the sun,

O'er many a heath, through many a woodland dun,

Through buried paths, where sleepy twilight dreams

The summer time away. One track unseams

A wooded cleft, and, far away, the blue

Of ocean fades upon him; then, anew,

He sinks adown a solitary glen,

Where there was never sound of mortal men,

Saving, perhaps, some snow-light cadences 80

Melting to silence, when upon the breeze

Some holy bark let forth an anthem sweet,

To cheer itself to Delphi. Still his feet

Went swift beneath the merry-winged guide,

Until it reached a splashing fountain's side

That, near a cavern's mouth, for ever pour'd

Unto the temperate air: then high it soar'd,

And, downward, suddenly began to dip,

As if, athirst with so much toil, 'twould sip