Poet's Corner

"Bright Star! Would I Were Steadfast as Thou Art"

John Keats

1	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,

5	The moving waters at their priestlike task
	Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
	Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
	Of snow upon the mountains and the moors – 

10	No – yet still steadfast, still unchangeable,
	Pillowed upon my fair love's ripening breast,
	To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
	Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
	Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,

15	And so live ever – or else swoon to death.

Source: Exploring Poetry, Gale, 1997.