Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, INSCRIPTION FOR A TABLET AT PENSHURST, by ROBERT SOUTHEY


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

INSCRIPTION FOR A TABLET AT PENSHURST, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Are days of old familiar to thy mind
Last Line: Lives and shall live, immortalized in song.
Subject(s): History; Honor; Immortality; Penshurst, England; Presence; Singing & Singers; Historians


ARE days of old familiar to thy mind,
O reader? hast thou let the midnight hour
Pass unperceived, whilst thy young fancy lived
With high-born beauties and enamour'd chiefs,
Shared all their hopes, and with a breathless joy
Whose eager expectation almost pain'd,
Follow'd their dangerous fortunes? if such lore
Has ever thrill'd thy bosom, thou wilt tread
As with a pilgrim's reverential thoughts
The groves of Penshurst. Sidney here was born,
Sidney, than whom no gentler, braver man
His own delightful genius ever feign'd
Illustrating the vales of Arcady
With courteous courage and with loyal loves.
Upon his natal day the acorn here
Was planted. It grew up a stately oak,
And in the beauty of its strength it stood
And flourish'd, when his perishable part
Had moulder'd dust to dust. That stately oak
Itself hath moulder'd now, but Sidney's fame
Lives and shall live, immortalized in song.





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net