Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art
Not in lone splendor hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like Nature’s patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priest like task
Of pure ablution round earth’s human shores,
Or grazing on the new soft fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—
No- yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,
Pillowed upon my fair love’s ripening breast,
To feel forever its soft fall and swell,
Awake forever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever- or else swoon to death.
JOHN KEATS
Aloft : high in the air
Eremite : hermit; devotee
Steadfast : firm
Swoon : faint
