Classic Poem

In Thessaly! And are they true — those visions that my eyes recall?
And was I ever there at all? Spring-time — in Thessaly — with you?

Was it but one fair day we passed, ridge after mountain ridge between,
Through tunneled cliff and stark ravine, to see the boundless plain at last?

To see at last with straining eyes Olympus' snow-white battlement,
With glistering cloud-summits blent, tower in the opalescent skies?

Oh! nevermore can I forget Larissa basking in the sun,
Or Trikkala when day is done, or Baba's lonely minaret,

Or Tempe where the plane-trees veil with dancing leaves the tawny stream,
Where on the cliffs the red-buds gleam, and first I heard the nightingale.

Still in my musings I behold the myriad poppies' blood-red stain;
Or see the dazzling floor again spread with the mustard's cloth of gold;

The women laying by the brooks their dripping blankets rainbow-dyed;
Swart shepherd lads unsmiling-eyed with olive-handled, carven crooks.

And fondly still my fancy tells how fair each dim-blue mountain smiles
Across the long, long, level miles, pink-white with waving asphodels;

While, high as barking eagles soar, Meteora's craggy summits frowned,
With crumbling monasteries crowned, above the gray-green valley floor.

For other eyes those glories stand, now other hearts are pulsing there;
No more we happy three may fare across that wide enchanted land.

But, Oh, the fates were kind to me, for once, ah! once I rode with you
In April when the skies were blue in Thessaly! in Thessaly!