Page:Keats - Poetical Works, DeWolfe, 1884.djvu/33

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So dear a picture of his sovereign power, And I could witness his most kingly hour, When he doth tighten up the golden reins, And paces leisurely down amber plains His snorting four. Now when his chariot last Its beams against the zodiac-lion cast, There blossom'd suddenly a magic bed Of sacred dittany, and poppies red: At which I wonder'd greatly, knowing well That but one night had wrought this flowery spell; And, sitting down close by, began to muse What it might mean. Perhaps, thought I, Morpheus, In passing here, his owlet pinions shook; Or, it may be, ere matron Night uptook Her ebon urn, young Mercury, by stealth, Had dipp'd his rod in it: such garland wealth Came not by common growth. Thus on I thought, Until my head was dizzy and' distraught. Moreover, through the dancing poppies stole A breeze most softly lulling to my soul; And shaping visions all about my sight Of colors, wings, and bursts of spangly light; The which became more strange, and strange, and dim And then were gulf'd in a tumultuous swim: And then I fell asleep. Ah, can I tell The enchantment that afterwards befell? Yet it was but a dream: yet such a dream That never tongue, although it overteem With mellow utterance, like a cavern spring, Could figure out and to conception bring All I beheld and felt. Methought I lay Watching the zenith, where the milky way