Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, TO HAYDON, WITH A SONNET WRITTEN ON SEEING THE ELGIN MARBLES, by JOHN KEATS



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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TO HAYDON, WITH A SONNET WRITTEN ON SEEING THE ELGIN MARBLES, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Haydon! Forgive me that I cannot speak
Last Line: Of their star in the east, and gone to worship them.


(ON SEEING THE ELGIN MARBLES)

HAYDON! forgive me that I cannot speak
Definitively on these mighty things;
Forgive me that I have not Eagle's wings--
That what I want I know not where to seek:
And think that I would not be over meek
In rolling out upfollow'd thunderings,
Even to the steep of Heliconian springs,
Were I of ample strength for such a freak--
Think too, that all those numbers should be thine;
Whose else? In this who touch thy vesture's hem?
For when men star'd at what was most divine
With browless idiotism--o'erwise phlegm--
Thou hadst beheld the Hesperean shine
Of their star in the East, and gone to worship them.





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