Poem by William Wordsworth

Prefatory Sonnet

Nuns fret not at their convent's narrow room;
And hermits are contented with their cells;
And students with their pensive citadels;
Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom,
Sit blithe and happy; bees that soar for bloom,
High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells,
Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells;
In truth the prison, unto which we doom
Ourselves, no prison is; and hence for me,
In sundry moods, 'twas pastime to be bound
Within the Sonnet's scanty plot of ground:
Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be)
Who have felt the weight of too much liberty,
Should find brief solace there, as I have found.

1. Calais
2. Composed on the Eve of the Marriage of a Friend in the Vale of Grasmere
3. On Approaching Home after a Tour in Scotland
4. To ———
5. Methought I Saw the Footsteps of a Throne

Print

7377 Views

Last Poems

To Russian version