Ode to the West Wind

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1. O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being,
2. Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
3. Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
4.  
5. Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
6. Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou, _5
7. Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
8.  
9. The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
10. Each like a corpse within its grave, until
11. Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
12.  
13. Her clarion o’er the dreaming earth, and fill _10
14. (Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
15. With living hues and odours plain and hill:
16.  
17. Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
18. Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh, hear!
19.  
20. 2.
21. Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky’s commotion, _15
22. Loose clouds like earth’s decaying leaves are shed,
23. Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
24.  
25. Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
26. On the blue surface of thine aery surge,
27. Like the bright hair uplifted from the head _20
28.  
29. Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
30. Of the horizon to the zenith’s height,
31. The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
32.  
33. Of the dying year, to which this closing night
34. Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre, _25
35. Vaulted with all thy congregated might
36.  
37. Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
38. Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh, hear!
39.  
40. 3.
41. Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
42. The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, _30
43. Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams,
44.  
45. Beside a pumice isle in Baiae’s bay,
46. And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
47. Quivering within the wave’s intenser day,
48.  
49. All overgrown with azure moss and flowers _35
50. So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
51. For whose path the Atlantic’s level powers
52.  
53. Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
54. The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
55. The sapless foliage of the ocean, know _40
56.  
57. Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
58. And tremble and despoil themselves: oh, hear!
59.  
60. 4.
61. If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
62. If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
63. A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share _45
64.  
65. The impulse of thy strength, only less free
66. Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even
67. I were as in my boyhood, and could be
68.  
69. The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,
70. As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed _50
71. Scarce seemed a vision; I would ne’er have striven
72.  
73. As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
74. Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
75. I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
76.  
77. A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed _55
78. One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.
79.  
80. 5.
81. Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
82. What if my leaves are falling like its own!
83. The tumult of thy mighty harmonies
84.  
85. Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone, _60
86. Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
87. My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!
88.  
89. Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
90. Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!
91. And, by the incantation of this verse, _65
92.  
93. Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth
94. Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
95. Be through my lips to unawakened earth
96.  
97. The trumpet of a prophecy! O, Wind,
98. If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind? _70
99.  
100. ***