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THE SONNET. |
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all: As a piece of versification the one by Shelley is simply a stanza of fourteen heroics, rhyming alternately, with one couplet introduced. The last one is appended more as a literary curiosity, an experiment in monosyllables.
TO WORDSWORTH.
Poet of Nature, thou hast wept to know
That things depart which never may return : Childhood and youth, friendship, and love's first glow,
Have fled like sweet dreams, leaving thee to mourn. These common woes I feel. One loss is mine,
Which thou too feel'st, yet I alone deplore, Thou wert as a lone star whose light did shine
On some frail bark in winter's midnight roar: Thou hast like to a rock-built refuge stood Above the blind and battling multitude : In honoured poverty thy voice did weave
Songs consecrate to truth and liberty. Deserting these, thou leavest me to grieve,
Thus, having been, that thou shouldst cease to be.
MONOSYLLABIC SONNET. .
Think not that strength lies in the big round word,
Or that the brief and plain must needs be weak. For whom can this be true who once has heard
The cry for help, the tongue that all men speak When want, or woe, or fear is in the throat,
So that each word gasped out is like a shriek Pressed from the sore heart: or a strange, wild note
Sung by some fay or fiend! There is a strength Which dies if stretched too far, or spun too fine ;
Which has more height than breadth, more depth than length. |
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