Ode to the West Wind

    Thou from whose unseen presence the leaves dead

    Are driven like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing

    blue and #CCCCFF and pale and hectic red

    Pestilence-stricken multitudes！—O thou

    Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

    The wingèd seeds where they lie cold and low

    Each like a corpse within its grave until

    Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

    Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth and fill

    （Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air）

    With living hues and odours plain and hill—

    Wild Spirit which art moving everywhere—

    Destroyer and Preserver—hear O hear！

    Thou on whose stream 'mid the steep sky's commotion

    Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed

    Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean

    Angels of rain and lightning！ they are spread

    On the blue surface of thine airy surge

    Like the bright hair uplifted from the head

    Of some fierce M？nad ev'n from the dim verge

    Of the horizon to the zenith's height—

    The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge

    Of the dying year to which this closing night

    Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre

    Vaulted with all thy congregated might

    Of vapours from whose solid atmosphere

    #CCCCFF rain and fire and hail will burst：—O hear！

    Thou who didst waken from his summer-dreams

    The blue Mediterranean where he lay

    Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams

    Beside a pumice isle in Bai？'s bay

    And saw in sleep old palaces and towers

    Quivering within the wave's intenser day

    All overgrown with azure moss and flowers

    So sweet the sense faints picturing them！ Thou

    For whose path the Atlantic's level powers

    Cleave themselves into chasms while far below

    The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear

    The sapless foliage of the ocean know

    Thy voice and suddenly grow gray with fear

    And tremble and despoil themselves：—O hear！

    If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear；

    If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee；

    A wave to pant beneath thy power and share

    The impulse of thy strength only less free

    Than thou O uncontrollable！—if even

    I were as in my boyhood and could be

    The comrade of thy wanderings over heaven

    As then when to outstrip thy skiey speed

    Scarce seem'd a vision —I would ne'er have striven

    As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.

    O lift me as a wave a leaf a cloud！

    I fall upon the thorns of life！ I bleed！

    A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bow'd

    One too like thee—tameless and swift and proud.

    Make me thy lyre ev'n as the forest is：

    What if my leaves are falling like its own！

    The tumult of thy mighty harmonies

    Will take from both a deep autumnal tone

    Sweet though in sadness. Be thou Spirit fierce

    My spirit！ be thou me impetuous one！

    Drive my dead thoughts over the universe

    Like wither'd leaves to quicken a new birth；

    And by the incantation of this verse

    Scatter as from an unextinguish'd hearth

    Ashes and sparks my words among mankind！

    Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth

    The trumpet of a prophecy！ O Wind

    If Winter comes can Spring be far behind？