The Nympholept

A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)

There was a boy — not above childish fears —

With steps that faltered now and straining ears,

Timid, irresolute, yet dauntless still,

Who one bright dawn, when each remotest hill

Stood sharp and clear in Heaven’s unclouded blue

And all Earth shimmered with fresh-beaded dew,

Risen in the first beams of the gladdening sun,

Walked up into the mountains. One by one

Each towering trunk beneath his sturdy stride

Fell back, and ever wider and more wide

The boundless prospect opened. Long he strayed,

From dawn till the last trace of slanting shade

Had vanished from the canyons, and, dismayed

At that far length to which his path had led,

He paused — at such a height where overhead

The clouds hung close, the air came thin and chill,

And all was hushed and calm and very still,

Save, from abysmal gorges, where the sound

Of tumbling waters rose, and all around

The pines, by those keen upper currents blown,

Muttered in multitudinous monotone.

Here, with the wind in lovely locks laid bare,

With arms oft raised in dedicative prayer,

Lost in mute rapture and adoring wonder,

He stood, till the far noise of noontide thunder,

Rolled down upon the muffled harmonies

Of wind and waterfall and whispering trees,

Made loneliness more lone. Some Panic fear

Would seize him then, as they who seemed to hear

In Tracian valleys or Thessalian woods

The god’s hallooing wake the leafy solitudes;

I think it was the same: some piercing sense

Of Deity’s pervasive immanence,

The Life that visible Nature doth indwell

Grown great and near and all but palpable . . .

He might not linger, but with winged strides

Like one pursued, fled down the mountain-sides —

Down the long ridge that edged the steep ravine,

By glade and flowery lawn and upland green,

And never paused nor felt assured again

But where the grassy foothills opened. Then,

While shadows lengthened on the plain below

And the sun vanished and the sunset-glow

Looked back upon the world with fervid eye

Through the barred windows of the western sky,

Homeward he fared, while many a look behind

Showed the receding ranges dim-outlined,

Highland and hollow where his path had lain,

Veiled in deep purple of the mountain rain.

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Poems in English 

• Sonnet 115: Those lines that I before have writ do lie by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 114: Or whether doth my mind, being crowned with you by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 113: Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 112: Your love and pity doth th’ impression fill by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 111: O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 110: Alas, ’tis true, I have gone here and there by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 10: For shame, deny that thou bear’st love to any by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 109: O, never say that I was false of heart by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 108: What’s in the brain that ink may character by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 107: Not mine own fears, nor the prophetic soul by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 106: When in the chronicle of wasted time by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 105: Let not my love be called idolatry by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 104: To me, fair friend, you never can be old by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 103: Alack, what poverty my Muse brings forth by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 102: My love is strengthened, though more weak in seeming by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 101: O truant Muse, what shall be thy amends by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 100: Where art thou, Muse, that thou forget’st so long by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet LIV by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Silvia by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sigh No More by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

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