Term
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling place. |
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Definition
Lord Byron
"She Walks in Beauty" |
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Term
Stop!--for they tread is on an Empire's dust!
An Earthquake's spoil is sepulchred below!
Is teh spot mark'd with no colossal bust?
Nor column trophied for triumphal show?
None; but the moral's truth tells simpler so,
As the ground was before, thus let it be;--
How that red rain hath made the harvest grow!
And is this all the world has gain'd by thee,
Thou first and last of fields! king-making Victory? |
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Definition
Lord Byron
"Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" |
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Term
Conqueror and captive of the earth art thou!
She trembles at thee still, and thy wild name
Was ne'er more bruited in men's minds than now
That thou art nothing, save the jest of Fame,
Who woo'd thee once, thy vassal, and became
The flatterer of thy fierceness, till thou wert
A god unto thyself; nor less the same
To the astounded kingdoms all inert,
Who deem'd thee for a time whate'er thou didst assert |
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Definition
Lord Byron
"Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" |
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Term
Could I embody and unbosom now
That which is most within me,--could I wreak
My thoughts upon expression, and thus throw
Soul, heart, mind, passions, feelings, strong or weak,
All that I would have sought, and all I seek,
Bear, know, feel, and yet breathe--into one word,
And that one word were Lightning, I would speak;
But as it is, I live and die unheard,
With a most voiceless thought, sheathing it as a sword. |
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Definition
Lord Byron
"Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" |
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Term
And if she met him, though she smiled no more,
She look'd a sadness sweeter than her smile,
As if her heart had deeper thoughts in store
She must not own, but cherish'd more the while
For that compression in its burning core;
Even innocence itself has many a wile,
And will not dare to trust itself with truth,
And love is taught hypocrisy from youth. |
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Definition
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Term
She now determined that a virtuous woman
Should rather face and overcome temptation,
That flight was base and dastardly, and no man
Should ever give her heart the least sensation;
That is to say, a thought beyond the common
Preference, that we must feel upon occasion,
For people who are pleasanter than others,
But then they only seem to many brothers. |
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Definition
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Term
And even if by chance--and who can tell?
The devil's so very sly--she should discover
That all within was not so very well,
And, if still free, that such or such a lover
Might please perhaps, a virtuous wife can quell
Such thoughts, and be the better when they're over;
And if the man should ask, 'tis but denial;
I recommend young ladies to make trial. |
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Definition
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Term
He thought about himself, and the whole earth,
Of man the wonderful, and of the stars,
And how the deuce they ever could have birth;
And then he thought of earthquakes, and of wars,
How many miles the moon might have in girth,
Of air-balloons, and of the many bars
To perfect knowledge of the boundless skies;--
And then he thought of Donne Julia's eyes. |
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Definition
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Term
"They tell me 'tis decided; you depart:
'Tis wise--'tis well, but not the less a pain;
I have no further claim on your young heart,
Mine is the victim, and would be again;
To love too much has been teh only art
I used;--I write in haste, and if a stain
Be on this sheet, 'tis not what it appears;
My eyeballs burn and throbm but have no tears." |
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Definition
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Term
Love, Hope, and Self-esteem, like clouds depart
And come, for some uncertain moments lent.
Man were immortal, and omnipotent,
Didst thou, unknown and awful as thou art,
Keep with thy glorious train firm state within his heart.
Thou messenger of sympathies,
That wax and wane in lovers' eyes--
Thou--that to human thought art nourishment,
Like darkness to a dying flame!
Depart not as thy shadow came,
Depart not--lest the grave should be,
Like life and fear, a dark reality. |
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Definition
Percy B. Shelley
"Hymn to Intellectual Beauty" |
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Term
To that high Capital, where kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay,
He came; and bought, with price of purest breath,
A grave among the eternal.--Come away!
Haste, while the vault of blue Italian day
Is yet his fitting charnel-roof! whiel still
He lies, as if in dewy sleep he lay;
Awake him not! surely he takes his fill
Of deep and liquid rest, forgetful of all ill. |
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Definition
Percy B. Shelley
"Adonais" |
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Term
Peace, peace! he is not dead, he doth not sleep--
He hath awakened from the dream of life--
'Tis we, who lost in stormy visions, keep
With phantoms an unprofitable strife,
And in mad trance, strike with our spirit's knife
Invulnerable nothings.--We decay
Like corpses in a charnel; fear and grief
Convulse us and consume us day by day,
And cold hopes swarm like worms within our living clay. |
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Definition
Percy B. Shelley
"Adonais" |
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Term
3 terza rima stanzas
1 ending couplet
A B A
B C B
C D C
D E D
E E
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Definition
Percy B. Shelley
"Ode to the West Wind" |
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Term
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Definition
Percy B. Shelley
"To a Sky-Lark" |
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Term
Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold,
And many goodly states and kingdoms have seen;
Round many western islands have I Been
Which bards infealty to Apollo hold. |
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Definition
John Keats
"On First Looking into Chapman's Homer" |
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Term
Oh what can ail thee, knight at arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing. |
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Definition
John Keats
"La Belle Dame sans Merci: A Ballad" |
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Term
10 line stanzas
A
B
A
B
C
D
E
C
D
E |
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Definition
John Keats
"Ode to a Nightengale" |
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Term
10 line stanzas
A
B
A
B
C
D
E
C
E
D |
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Definition
John Keats
"Ode to a Grecian Urn" |
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Term
The day appeared, and all the gossip route.
O senseless Lycius! Madman! wherefore flout
The silent-blessing fate, warm cloister'd hours,
And show to common eyes these secret bowers?
The herd approach'd; each guest, with busy brain,
Arriving at the portal, gaz'd amain,
And enter'd marveling: for they knew the street,
Remember'd it from childhood all complete
Without a gap, yet ne'er before had seen
That royal porch, that high-built fair demesne. |
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Definition
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Term
11 line stanzas
A
B
A
B
C
D
E
D
C
C
E |
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Definition
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Term
6 line stanzas
A
B
A
B
A
B |
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Definition
Lord Byron
"She Walks in Beauty" |
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Term
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Definition
Percy B. Shelley
"The Mask of Anarchy" |
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Term
26 line stanzas
A B B B B
C C D D E E
F F G G G
H H I I J J
K K L L A |
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Definition
John Keats
From Sleep and Poetry |
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Term
9 line stanzas
A
B
A
B
C
B
C
C |
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Definition
John Keats
"The Eve of St. Agnes" |
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