Classic Poem

DURING A MIDSUMMER WALK FROM WARMINSTER TO SHAFTESBURY . 1799.

O SPARE me — spare me, Phaebus! if indeed
Thou hast not let another Phaiton
Drive earthward thy fierce steeds and fiery car;
Mercy! I melt! I melt! No tree, no bush,
No shelter, not a breath of stirring air
East, West, or North, or South! Dear God of day,
Put on thy nightcap; crop thy locks of light,
And be in the fashion; turn thy back upon us,
And let thy beams flow upward; make it night
Instead of noon; — one little miracle,
In pity, gentle Phaebus!
What a joy,
Oh what a joy, to be a seal and flounder
On an ice island! or to have a den
With the white bear, cavern'd in polar snow!
It were a comfort to shake hands with Death, —
He has a rare cold hand! — to wrap one's self
In the gift shirt Dejanira sent,
Dipt in the blood of Nessus, just to keep
The sun off; or toast cheese for Beelzebub, —
That were a cool employment to this journey
Along a road whose white intensity
Would now make platina uncongealable
Like quicksilver.
Were it midnight, I should walk
Self-lantern'd, saturate with sunbeams. Jove!
O gentle Jove! have mercy, and once more
Kick that obdurate Phaebus out of heaven;
Give Boreas the wind-cholic, till he roar
For cardamum, and drink down peppermint,
Making what's left as precious as Tokay;
Send Mercury to salivate the sky
Till it dissolve in rain. O gentle Jove!
But some such little kindness to a wretch
Who feels his marrow spoiling his best coat, —
Who swells with calorique as if a Prester
Had leaven'd every limb with poison-yeast; —
Lend me thine eagle just to flap his wings
And fan me, and I will build temples to thee,
And turn true Pagan.
Not a cloud nor breeze, —
O you most heathen Deities! if ever
My bones reach home (for, for the flesh upon them,
It hath resolved itself into a dew,)
I shall have learnt owl-wisdom. Thou vile Phaebus,
Set me a Persian sun-idolater
Upon this turnpike road, and I'll convert him
With no inquisitorial argument
But thy own fires. Now woe be to me, wretch,
That I was in a heretic country born!
Else might some mass for the poor souls that bleach,
And burn away the calx of their offences
In that great Purgatory crucible,
Help me. O Jupiter! my poor complexion!
I am made a copper-Indian of already;
And if no kindly cloud will parasol me,
My very cellular membrane will be changed, —
I shall be negrofied.
A brook! a brook!
O what a sweet, cool sound!
'Tis very nectar!
It runs like life through every strengthen'd limb!
Nymph of the stream, now take a grateful prayer.