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The River Duddon - A Series Of Sonnets, 1820. - XXII - Tradition

By William Wordsworth

Topics: classic

A love-lorn Maid, at some far-distant time, Came to this hidden pool, whose depths surpass In crystal clearness Dian's looking-glass; And, gazing, saw that Rose, which from the prime Derives its name, reflected, as the chime Of echo doth reverberate some sweet sound: The starry treasure from the blue profound She longed to ravish; shall she plunge, or climb The humid precipice, and seize the guest Of April, smiling high in upper air? Desperate alternative! what fiend could dare To prompt the thought? Upon the steep rock's breast The lonely Primrose yet renews its bloom, Untouched memento of her hapless doom!

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Author:William Wordsworth

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"A love-lorn Maid, at some far-distant time,..." by William Wordsworth

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"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

William Wordsworth

About William Wordsworth

William Wordsworth (1770–1850) was an English Romantic poet who launched the movement with Samuel Taylor Coleridge in "Lyrical Ballads" (1798). His poems—including "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" and "Tintern Abbey"—championed nature, memory, and the language of common speech.

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