Samuel Coleridge - The Complete Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (Illustrated Edition)

Then suddenly with timorous eye

She fled to me and wept.

She half inclosed me with her arms,

She press’d me with a meek embrace;

And bending back her head look’d up,

And gaz’d upon my face.

’Twas partly Love, and partly Fear,

And partly ‘twas a bashful Art

That I might rather feel than see

The Swelling of her Heart.

I calm’d her Tears; and she was calm,

And told her love with virgin Pride.

And so I won my Genevieve,

My bright and beauteous Bride!

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Her eyes are wild, her head is bare,

The sun has burnt her coal-black hair,

Her eyebrows have a rusty stain,

And she came far from over the main.

She has a baby on her arm,

Or else she were alone;

And underneath the hay-stack warm,

And on the greenwood stone,

She talked and sung the woods among;

And it was in the English tongue.

”Sweet babe! they say that I am mad,

But nay, my heart is far too glad;

And I am happy when I sing

Full many a sad and doleful thing:

Then, lovely baby, do not fear!

I pray thee have no fear of me,

But, safe as in a cradle, here

My lovely baby! thou shalt be,

To thee I know too much I owe;

I cannot work thee any woe.”

A fire was once within my brain;

And in my head a dull, dull pain;

And fiendish faces one, two, three,

Hung at my breasts, and pulled at me.

But then there came a sight of joy;

It came at once to do me good;

I waked, and saw my little boy,

My little boy of flesh and blood;

Oh joy for me that sight to see!

For he was here, and only he.

Suck, little babe, oh suck again!

It cools my blood; it cools my brain;

Thy lips I feel them, baby! they

Draw from my heart the pain away.

Oh! press me with thy little hand;

It loosens something at my chest;

About that tight and deadly band

I feel thy little fingers press’d.

The breeze I see is in the tree;

It comes to cool my babe and me.

Oh! love me, love me, little boy!

Thou art thy mother’s only joy;

And do not dread the waves below,

When o’er the sea-rock’s edge we go;

The high crag cannot work me harm,

Nor leaping torrents when they howl;

The babe I carry on my arm,

He saves for me my precious soul;

Then happy lie, for blest am I;

Without me my sweet babe would die.

Then do not fear, my boy! for thee

Bold as a lion I will be;

And I will always be thy guide,

Through hollow snows and rivers wide.

I’ll build an Indian bower; I know

The leaves that make the softest bed:

And if from me thou wilt not go.

But still be true ‘till I am dead,

My pretty thing! then thou shalt sing,

As merry as the birds in spring.

Thy father cares not for my breast,

’Tis thine, sweet baby, there to rest:

’Tis all thine own! and if its hue

Be changed, that was so fair to view,

’Tis fair enough for thee, my dove!

My beauty, little child, is flown;

But thou will live with me in love,

And what if my poor cheek be brown?

’Tis well for me, thou canst not see

How pale and wan it else would be.

Dread not their taunts, my little life!

I am thy father’s wedded wife;

And underneath the spreading tree

We two will live in honesty.

If his sweet boy he could forsake,

With me he never would have stay’d:

From him no harm my babe can take,

But he, poor man! is wretched made,

And every day we two will pray

For him that’s gone and far away.

I’ll teach my boy the sweetest things;

I’ll teach him how the owlet sings.

My little babe! thy lips are still,

And thou hast almost suck’d thy fill.

— Where art thou gone my own dear child?

What wicked looks are those I see?

Alas! alas! that look so wild,

It never, never came from me:

If thou art mad, my pretty lad,

Then I must be for ever sad.

Oh! smile on me, my little lamb!

For I thy own dear mother am.

My love for thee has well been tried:

I’ve sought thy father far and wide.

I know the poisons of the shade,

I know the earth-nuts fit for food;

Then, pretty dear, be not afraid;

We’ll find thy father in the wood.

Now laugh and be gay, to the woods away!

And there, my babe; we’ll live for aye.

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A POET’S REVERIE.

By Samuel Taylor Coleridge

ARGUMENT.

How a Ship, having first sailed to the Equator, was driven by Storms, to the cold Country towards the South Pole; how the Ancient Mariner cruelly, and in contempt of the laws of hospitality, killed a Seabird; and how he was followed by many and strange Judgements; and in what manner he came back to his own Country.

THE ANCIENT MARINER.

A POET’S REVERIE.

I.

It is an ancient Mariner,

And he stoppeth one of three:

”By thy long grey beard and thy glittering eye

Now wherefore stoppest me?”

”The Bridegroom’s doors are open’d wide

And I am next of kin;

The Guests are met, the Feast is set, —

May’st hear the merry din.”

But still he holds the wedding guest —

”There was a Ship, quoth he—”

”Nay, if thou’st got a laughsome tale,

Mariner! come with me.”

He holds him with his skinny hand,

Quoth he, there was a Ship —

”Now get thee hence, thou greybeard Loon

Or my Staff shall make thee skip.”

He holds him with his glittering eye —

The wedding guest stood still

And listens like a three year’s child;

The Mariner hath his will.

The wedding-guest sate on a stone,

He cannot chuse but hear:

And thus spake on that ancient man,

The bright-eyed Mariner.

The Ship was cheer’d, the Harbour clear’d —

Merrily did we drop

Below the Kirk, below the Hill,

Below the Lighthouse top.

The Sun came up upon the left,

Out of the Sea came he:

And he shone bright, and on the right

Went down into the Sea.

Higher and higher every day,

Till over the mast at noon —

The wedding-guest here beat his breast,

For he heard the loud bassoon.

The Bride hath pac’d into the Hall,

Red as a rose is she;

Nodding their heads before her goes

The merry Minstralsy.

The wedding-guest he beat his breast,

Yet he cannot chuse but hear:

And thus spake on that ancient Man,

The bright-eyed Mariner.

But now the Northwind came more fierce,

There came a Tempest strong!

And Southward still for days and weeks

Like Chaff we drove along.

And now there came both Mist and Snow,

And it grew wond’rous cold;

And Ice mast-high came floating by

As green as Emerald.

And thro’ the drifts the snowy clifts

Did send a dismal sheen;

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken —

The Ice was all between.

The Ice was here, the Ice was there,

The Ice was all around:

It crack’d and growl’d, and roar’d and howl’d —

A wild and ceaseless sound.

At length did cross an Albatross,

Thorough the Fog it came;

As if it had been a Christian Soul,

We hail’d it in God’s name.

The Mariners gave it biscuit-worms,

And round and round it flew:

The Ice did split with a Thunder-fit;

The Helmsman steer’d us thro’.

And a good south wind sprung up behind.

The Albatross did follow;

And every day for food or play

Came to the Mariner’s hollo!