Hartley Coleridge

I have been cherish’d and forgiven
By many tender-hearted,
’Twas for the sake of one in Heaven
Of him that is departed.

Because I bear my Father’s name
I am not quite despised,
My little legacy of fame
I’ve not yet realized.

And yet if you should praise myself
I’ll tell you, I had rather
You’d give your love to me, poor elf,
Your praise to my great father.

Long time a child, and still a child, when years
Had painted manhood on my cheek, was I,—
For yet I lived like one not born to die;
A thriftless prodigal of smiles and tears,
No hope I needed, and I knew no fears.
But sleep, though sweet, is only sleep, and waking,
I waked to sleep no more, at once o’ertaking
The vanguard of my age, with all arrears

Like a loose island on the wide expanse,
Unconscious floating on the fickle sea,
Herself her all, she lives in privacy;
Her waking life as lonely as a trance,
Doom’d to behold the universal dance,
And never hear the music which expounds
The solemn step, coy slide, the merry bounds.
The vague, mute language of the countenance.