Task and Other Poems by William Cowper
page 94 of 199 (47%)
page 94 of 199 (47%)
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The globe and its concerns, I seem advanced
To some secure and more than mortal height, That liberates and exempts me from them all. It turns submitted to my view, turns round With all its generations; I behold The tumult and am still. The sound of war Has lost its terrors ere it reaches me; Grieves, but alarms me not. I mourn the pride And avarice that makes man a wolf to man; Hear the faint echo of those brazen throats By which he speaks the language of his heart, And sigh, but never tremble at the sound. He travels and expatiates, as the bee From flower to flower so he from land to land; The manners, customs, policy of all Pay contribution to the store he gleans, He sucks intelligence in every clime, And spreads the honey of his deep research At his return--a rich repast for me. He travels and I too. I tread his deck, Ascend his topmast, through his peering eyes Discover countries, with a kindred heart Suffer his woes and share in his escapes; While fancy, like the finger of a clock, Runs the great circuit, and is still at home. Oh Winter, ruler of the inverted year, Thy scattered hair with sleet-like ashes filled, Thy breath congealed upon thy lips, thy cheeks Fringed with a beard made white with other snows |
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