Page:Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918.djvu/835

 RALPH WALDO EMERSON

Form of forms, and mould of statures,

That I intoxicated,

And by the draught assimilated,

May float at pleasure through all natures;

The bird-language rightly spell,

And that which roses say so well:

Wine that is shed

Like the torrents of the sun

Up the horizon walls,

Or like the Atlantic streams, which run

When the South Sea calls.

Water and bread,

Food which needs no transmuting,

Rainbow -flowering, wisdom-fruiting,

Wine which is already man,

Food which teach and reason can.

Wine which Music is,

Music and wine are one,

That I, drinking this,

Shall hear far Chaos talk with me;

Kings unborn shall walk with me;

And the poor grass, shall plot and plan

What it will do when it is man.

Quicken'd so, will 1 unlock

Every crypt of every rock.

I thank the joyful juice

For all I know;

Winds of remembering

Of the ancient being blow,

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