“Bright Star” by John Keats
Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art--
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—
No – yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,
Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever – or else swoon to death.
'Romantic Poet' by me
Romantic Poet, the Genius contain’d –
Emulation not by common man made
Able, with a worldly mind much constrain’d,
Like a determined mountain’s wall blockade
Against Nature’s forces of corrosion
Of winds and rain; the landslide’s formation.
And the remains suffer some erosion
Of sand through the breeze’s liberation –
Yes – still abstract albeit foreseeable,
Nestl’d within the recesses of Mind,
To grasp with the identifiable,
Something to which something can be aligned.
Must unwavering possession beget,
And so forever live – or else forget.
I liked the inclusion of the reading of Keats' poem... now why not include a reading of your own remodeled version? :)
ReplyDeleteThe first line of your poem is very striking:
"Romantic poet, the Genius Contain'd--"
It suggests both greatness in excess and greatness limited--a genius at once bound by human existence and freed by human thought. This "Genius Contain'd" would make for a wonderful emblem of Romanticism. Moreover, the final lines suggest the irony of Romantic thought:
"And so forever live -- or else forget."
The poem's internal workings are nicely bookended by these lines. Great work!