Songs of Innocence and Experience

Blake, William

• Publisher: pubOne.info
• Year: 2010
• eBook ISBN: 9782819935827
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Classics
• Index: Literature

pubOne.info present you this new edition. From the morn to the evening he strays;

THE LITTLE GIRL FOUND

  All the night in woe

  Lyca’s parents go

  Over valleys deep,

  While the deserts wee

  Tired and woe-begone,

  Hoarse with making moan,

  Arm in arm, seven days

  They traced the desert ways.

  Seven nights they sleep

  Among shadows deep,

  And dream they see their child

  Starved in desert wild.

  Pale through pathless ways

  The fancied image strays,

  Famished, weeping, weak,

  With hollow piteous shriek.

  Rising from unrest,

  The trembling woman pressed

  With feet of weary woe;

  She could no further go.

  In his arms he bore

  Her, armed with sorrow sore;

  Till before their way

  A couching lion lay.

  Turning back was vain:

  Soon his heavy mane

  Bore them to the ground,

  Then he stalked around,

  Smelling to his prey;

  But their fears allay

  When he licks their hands,

  And silent by them stands.

  They look upon his eyes,

  Filled with deep surprise;

  And wondering behold

  A spirit armed in gold.

  On his head a crown,

  On his shoulders down

  Flowed his golden hair.

  Gone was all their care.

  ‘Follow me, ’ he said;

  ‘Weep not for the maid;

  In my palace deep,

  Lyca lies aslee’

  Then they followèd

  Where the vision led,

  And saw their sleeping child

  Among tigers wild.

  To this day they dwell

  In a lonely dell,

  Nor fear the wolvish howl

  Nor the lion’s growl.

THE CHIMNEY-SWEEPER

  A little black thing among the snow,

  Crying! ‘weep! weep! ’ in notes of woe!

  ‘Where are thy father and mother? Say! ’—

  ‘They are both gone up to the church to pray.

  ‘Because I was happy upon the heath,

  And smiled among the winter’s snow,

  They clothed me in the clothes of death,

  And taught me to sing the notes of woe.

  ‘And because I am happy and dance and sing,

  They think they have done me no injury,

  And are gone to praise God and His priest and king,

  Who made up a heaven of our misery. ’

NURSE’S SONG

  When the voices of children are heard on the green,

   And whisperings are in the dale,

  The days of my youth rise fresh in my mind,

   My face turns green and pale.

  Then come home, my children, the sun is gone down,

   And the dews of night arise;

  Your spring and your day are wasted in play,

   And your winter and night in disguise.

THE SICK ROSE

  O rose, thou art sick!

   The invisible worm,

  That flies in the night,

   In the howling storm,

  Has found out thy bed

   Of crimson joy,

  And his dark secret love

   Does thy life destroy.

THE FLY

  Little Fly,

  Thy summer’s play

  My thoughtless hand

  Has brushed away.

  Am not I

  A fly like thee?

  Or art not thou

  A man like me?

  For I dance,

  And drink, and sing,

  Till some blind hand

  Shall brush my wing.

  If thought is life

  And strength and breath,

  And the want

  Of thought is death;

  Then am I

  A happy fly.

  If I live,

  Or if I die.

THE ANGEL

I dreamt a dream! What can it mean?

And that I was a maiden Queen

Guarded by an Angel mild:

Witless woe was ne’er beguiled!

And I wept both night and day,

And he wiped my tears away;

And I wept both day and night,

And hid from him my heart’s delight.

So he took his wings, and fled;

Then the morn blushed rosy red.

I dried my tears, and armed my fears

With ten thousand shields and spears.

Soon my Angel cam...

Table of contents

• INTRODUCTION
• THE SHEPHERD
• THE ECHOING GREEN
• THE LAMB
• THE LITTLE BLACK BOY
• THE BLOSSOM
• THE CHIMNEY-SWEEPER
• THE LITTLE BOY LOST
• THE LITTLE BOY FOUND
• LAUGHING SONG
• A CRADLE SONG
• THE DIVINE IMAGE
• HOLY THURSDAY
• NIGHT
• SPRING
• NURSE’S SONG
• INFANT JOY
• A DREAM
• ON ANOTHER’S SORROW
• SONGS OF EXPERIENCE
• EARTH’S ANSWER
• THE CLOD AND THE PEBBLE
• HOLY THURSDAY
• THE LITTLE GIRL LOST
• THE LITTLE GIRL FOUND
• THE CHIMNEY-SWEEPER
• NURSE’S SONG
• THE SICK ROSE
• THE FLY
• THE ANGEL
• THE TIGER
• MY PRETTY ROSE TREE
• AH, SUNFLOWER
• THE LILY
• THE GARDEN OF LOVE
• THE LITTLE VAGABOND
• LONDON
• THE HUMAN ABSTRACT
• INFANT SORROW
• A POISON TREE
• A LITTLE BOY LOST
• A LITTLE GIRL LOST
• A DIVINE IMAGE
• A CRADLE SONG
• THE SCHOOLBOY
• TO TIRZAH
• THE VOICE OF THE ANCIENT BARD
• Copyright