On First Looking Into the Manuscript of Endymion
I DARED not dream that this dream could come true:
That I was bending over that yellow page
Lit with his words—our boy, our poet, our sage—
And that I touched the parchment, old yet new,
Whereon his fingers once had been. I grew
Strangely afraid, as if some heritage
Of wonder from a distant, holy age
Had suddenly fallen on me, like soft dew.
“A thing of beauty is a joy forever. …” There
I read his lovely line, what time I dipped
Into that hushed and haunted manuscript
That Love and Time have made even lovelier.
Oh, I could only dream; yea, dream and weep. …
Was it a vision?—Did I wake or sleep?
That I was bending over that yellow page
Lit with his words—our boy, our poet, our sage—
And that I touched the parchment, old yet new,
Whereon his fingers once had been. I grew
Strangely afraid, as if some heritage
Of wonder from a distant, holy age
Had suddenly fallen on me, like soft dew.
“A thing of beauty is a joy forever. …” There
I read his lovely line, what time I dipped
Into that hushed and haunted manuscript
That Love and Time have made even lovelier.
Oh, I could only dream; yea, dream and weep. …
Was it a vision?—Did I wake or sleep?
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