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？