Raymond Biswanger Slide Collection
William Wordsworth: 1883
Cockermouth, Copeland, and Penrith, Cumbria
Poems Composed or Suggested During a Tour in the Summer of 1833VII. Address from the Spirit of Cockermouth Castle
“THOU look'st upon me, and dost fondly think,
Poet! that, stricken as both are by years,
We, differing once so much, are now Compeers,
Prepared, when each has stood his time, to sink
Into the dust. Erewhile a sterner link
United us; when thou, in boyish play,
Entering my dungeon, didst become a prey
To soul-appalling darkness. Not a blink
Of light was there;--and thus did I, thy Tutor,
Make thy young thoughts acquainted with the grave;
While thou wert chasing the winged butterfly
Through my green courts; or climbing, a bold suitor,
Up to the flowers whose golden progeny
Still round my shattered brow in beauty wave.”
William Wordsworth (1833)
Cockermouth Castle, Cockermouth, Cumbria [2 May 1985]
Poems Composed or Suggested During a Tour in the Summer of 1833
XI. Stanzas Suggested In A Steamboat Off Saint Bees' Heads, On The Coast Of Cumberland
IF Life were slumber on a bed of down,
Toil unimposed, vicissitude unknown,
Sad were our lot: no hunter of the hare
Exults like him whose javelin from the lair
Has roused the lion; no one plucks the rose,
Whose proffered beauty in safe shelter blows
'Mid a trim garden's summer luxuries,
With joy like his who climbs, on hands and knees,
For some rare plant, yon Headland of St. Bees.
This independence upon oar and sail,
This new indifference to breeze or gale,
This straight-lined progress, furrowing a flat lea,
And regular as if locked in certainty--
Depress the hours. Up, Spirit of the storm!
That Courage may find something to perform;
That Fortitude, whose blood disdains to freeze
At Danger's bidding, may confront the seas,
Firm as the towering Headlands of St. Bees.
William Wordsworth (1833)
Saint Bees Head, Copeland, Cumbria [26 September 1987]
Poems Composed or Suggested During a Tour in the Summer of 1833
XLIII. The Monument Commonly Called Long Meg and Her Daughters, Near the River Eden
A WEIGHT of awe, not easy to be borne,
Fell suddenly upon my Spirit--cast
From the dread bosom of the unknown past,
When first I saw that family forlorn.
Speak Thou, whose massy strength and stature scorn
The power of years--pre-eminent, and placed
Apart, to overlook the circle vast--
Speak, Giant-mother! tell it to the Morn
While she dispels the cumbrous shades of Night;
Let the Moon hear, emerging from a cloud;
At whose behest uprose on British ground
That Sisterhood, in hieroglyphic round
Forth-shadowing, some have deemed, the infinite
The inviolable God, that tames the proud!
William Wordsworth (1833)
Long Meg and Her Daughters, near Little Salkeld, Penrith, Cumbria [27 September 1987]
