work_id,theme,provenance,created_at,text,reviewed_on,id,comments,metaphor,dictionary,updated_at,context
6166,"",HDIS (Poetry),2003-12-30 00:00:00 UTC,"You bid me write to amuse the tedious hours,
And save from withering my poetic powers;
Hard is the task, my friend, for verse should flow
From the free mind, not fetter'd down by woe.
Restless amidst unceasing tempests toss'd,
Whoe'er has cause for sorrow, I have most.
Would you bid Priam laugh, his sons all slain;
Or childless Niobe from tears refrain,
Join the gay dance, and lead the festive train?
Does grief or study most befit the mind
To this remote, this barbarous nook confined?
Could you impart to my unshaken breast
The fortitude by Socrates possess'd,
Soon would it sink beneath such woes as mine,
For what is human strength to wrath divine?
Wise as he was, and Heaven pronounced him so,
My sufferings would have laid that wisdom low.
Could I forget my country, thee and all,
And e'en the offence to which I owe my fall,
Yet fear alone would freeze the poet's vein,
While hostile troops swarm o'er the dreary plain.
Add that the fatal rust of long disuse
Unfits me for the service of the Muse.
Thistles and weeds are all we can expect
From the best soil impoverish'd by neglect;
Unexercised, and to his stall confined,
The fleetest racer would be left behind;
The best built bark that cleaves the watery way,
Laid useless by, would moulder and decay,--
No hope remains that time shall me restore,
Mean as I was, to what I was before.
Think how a series of desponding cares
Benumbs the genius and its force impairs.
How oft, as now, on this devoted sheet,
My verse constrain'd to move with measured feet,
Reluctant and laborious limps along,
And proves itself a wretched exile's song.
What is it tunes the most melodious lays?
'Tis emulation and the thirst of praise,
A noble thirst, and not unknown to me,
While smoothly wafted on a calmer sea.
But can a wretch like Ovid pant for fame?
No, rather let the world forget my name.
Is it because that world approved my strain,
You prompt me to the same pursuit again?
No, let the Nine the ungrateful truth excuse,
I charge my hopeless ruin on the Muse,
And, like Perillus, meet my just desert,
The victim of my own pernicious art;
Fool that I was to be so warn'd in vain,
And shipwreck'd once, to tempt the deep again!
Ill fares the bard in this unletter'd land,
None to consult, and none to understand.
The purest verse has no admirers here,
Their own rude language only suits their ear.
Rude as it is, at length familiar grown,
I learn it, and almost unlearn my own;--
Yet to say truth, even here the Muse disdains
Confinement, and attempts her former strains,
But finds the strong desire is not the power,
And what her taste condemns, the flames devour.
A part, perhaps, like this, escapes the doom,
And though unworthy, finds a friend at Rome;
But oh the cruel art, that could undo
Its votary thus! would that could perish too!
(ll. 1-65, pp. 5-6)",2011-06-27,16333,"","""You bid me write to amuse the tedious hours, / And save from withering my poetic powers; / Hard is the task, my friend, for verse should flow / From the free mind, not fetter'd down by woe.""",Fetters,2011-05-27 14:26:25 UTC,I've included the entire poem
6255,"",Searching HDIS (Poetry),2005-05-27 00:00:00 UTC,"""To wake the soul by tender strokes of art,
To raise the genius, and to mend the heart,""--
Hold, hold! that's not my cue, we 've no intention
By ""tender strokes"" to sharpen girls' invention:
The soul will waken time enough, ne'er fear;
No lines shall rouse the slumbering passions here.
O! ever sacred be the deep repose
Which Youth, on Innocence' pure bosom, knows;
Before a wish, a throb, a care, have taught
The pangs of feeling or the lines of thought.
O happy period! soon to pass away,
Soon will the swelling gales assert their sway,
And drive the vessel from the sheltered port,--
O guide it Heaven!--of winds and waves the sport.
Nor yet ""to raise the genius"" is our aim,
With Shakespear's high-wrought scenes and words of flame.
A little story, drawn from fairy lore,
A nursery tale, this evening we explore:
""To mend the heart,"" indeed, we mean to try,
And show what poison lurks in flattery.
'Tis true our hero was a prince--what then!
Believe me, Flattery stoops to common men.
A little dose, made up with skill and care,
A grain or two of incense, all can bear:
'Tis life's first rule,--by complaisance we live;
All flatter all, and to receive we give.
Myself, for instance, am sent here tonight
With soothing speech your favour to invite;
And when our piece is done, perhaps e'en you,
My gentle auditors, may flatter too,
And make us boast our talents and our skill,
When all the merit is in your good will.
But there's a theme which asks a verse this day,
Where Flattery has no power her tints to lay;
This hallowed day, in Hymen's golden bands
Which joined consenting hearts and willing hands.
How many years ago should any ask,
Look round,--to count them is an easy task;
Each tiptoe girl, and each aspiring boy,
Date, as they pass, the years of love and joy.
O happy state! where blessings number years,
And smiles are only quenched in more delicious tears.
Here, should my willing lips the theme pursue,
And draw the lovely scene in colours due,
Paint the well-ordered home, the sacred seat
Where social joys and active virtues meet;
These wield in love, and those in love obey
The peaceful sceptre of domestic sway;
Where sparkling Fancy weaves her airy dream,
And Science sheds around her steady beam,--
Each answering heart the faithful sketch would own,
And glow with feelings raised by truth alone.",2011-06-26,16558,"•C-H categorizes in Poetry. REVISIT issues of genre.
•Bands belong under Fetters?","""This hallowed day, in Hymen's golden bands / Which joined consenting hearts and willing hands.""",Fetters,2011-05-27 14:27:39 UTC,I've included the entire Prologue
6968,"",Reading,2011-06-23 17:22:01 UTC,"Oft has the wintry blast deformed the year,
And Zephyr oft restored the vernal bloom,
Florio! Since first I breathed the sigh sincere,
And twin’d the cypress garland round thy tomb.
Tho’ long composed thy peaceful ashes sleep
In worlds remote beneath the Southern pole;
Nor wide stretched lands, nor interposing deep,
Can check the progess of th’ unfetter’d soul.
(pp. 47-8)",,18786,"","""Nor wide stretched lands, nor interposing deep, / Can check the progess of th’ unfetter’d soul.""",Fetters,2011-06-23 17:22:01 UTC,""
7082,"",Reading,2011-09-06 15:04:35 UTC,"What is it that hangs from thy shoulder, so brave,
Embroidered with many a spring peering flower?
Is it a scarf that thy fair lady gave?
And hastest thou now to that fair lady's bower?
Ah! courteous Sir Knight, with large joy thou art crown'd;
Full many the glories that brighten thy youth!
I will tell thee my blisses, which richly abound
In magical powers to bless, and to sooth.
On this scroll thou seest written in characters fair
A sun-beamy tale of a wreath, and a chain;
And, warrior, it nurtures the property rare
Of charming my mind from the trammels of pain.",,19136,"","""On this scroll thou seest written in characters fair / A sun-beamy tale of a wreath, and a chain; / And, warrior, it nurtures the property rare / Of charming my mind from the trammels of pain.""","",2011-09-06 15:04:35 UTC,""
7167,"","Searching ""chain"" and ""soul"" in HDIS (Poetry)",2012-01-12 04:00:53 UTC," ""Dost thou not see,--or art thou blind with age,--
How many Graces on her eyelids sit,
Linking those viewless chains that bind the soul,
And sharpening smooth discourse with pointed wit;
How many where she moves attendant wait,
The slow smooth step inspire, or high commanding gait?",,19448,"","""Dost thou not see,--or art thou blind with age,-- / How many Graces on her eyelids sit, / Linking those viewless chains that bind the soul, / And sharpening smooth discourse with pointed wit.""",Fetters,2012-01-12 04:01:12 UTC,""
7305,"",Reading,2012-07-24 19:48:59 UTC,"When I take up a work that I have read before (the oftener the better) I know what I have to expect. The satisfaction is not lessened by being anticipated. When the entertainment is altogether new, I sit down to it as I should to a strange dish,--turn and pick out a bit here and there, and am in doubt what to think of the composition. There is a want of confidence and security to second appetite. New-fangled books are also like made-dishes in this respect, that they are generally little else than hashes and rifaccimentos of what has been served up entire and in a more natural state at other times. Besides, in thus turning to a well-known author, there is not only an assurance that my time will not be thrown away, or my palate nauseated with the most insipid or vilest trash,--but I shake hands with, and look an old, tried, and valued friend in the face,--compare notes, and chat the hours away. It is true, we form dear friendships with such ideal guests—dearer, alas! and more lasting, than those with our most intimate acquaintance. In reading a book which is an old favourite with me (say the first novel I ever read) I not only have the pleasure of imagination and of a critical relish of the work, but the pleasures of memory added to it. It recals the same feelings and associations which I had in first reading it, and which I can never have again in any other way. Standard productions of this kind are links in the chain of our conscious being. They bind together the different scattered divisions of our personal identity. They are land-marks and guides in our journey through life. They are pegs and loops on which we can hang up, or from which we can take down, at pleasure, the wardrobe of a moral imagination, the relics of our best affections, the tokens and records of our happiest hours. They are ""for thoughts and for remembrance!"" They are like Fortunatus's Wishing-Cap—they give us the best riches—those of Fancy; and transport us, not over half the globe, but (which is better) over half our lives, at a word's notice!
(pp. 65-6)",,19890,"","""Standard productions of this kind are links in the chain of our conscious being. They bind together the different scattered divisions of our personal identity.""",Fetters,2012-07-24 19:48:59 UTC,""