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Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)

To Jane: "The Keen Stars Were Twinkling"


              1      The keen stars were twinkling,
              2And the fair moon was rising among them,
              3           Dear Jane.
              4The guitar was tinkling,
              5      But the notes were not sweet till you sung them
              6           Again.

              7      As the moon's soft splendour
              8O'er the faint cold starlight of Heaven
              9           Is thrown,
            10      So your voice most tender
            11To the strings without soul had then given
            12           Its own.

            13      The stars will awaken,
            14Though the moon sleep a full hour later
            15           To-night;
            16      No leaf will be shaken
            17Whilst the dews of your melody scatter
            18           Delight.

            19      Though the sound overpowers,
            20Sing again, with your dear voice revealing
            21           A tone
            22      Of some world far from ours,
            23Where music and moonlight and feeling
            24           Are one.

Notes

1] Published in part in The Athenaeum (1832) and completed by Mary Shelley, the poet's wife, in her second collected edition of 1839. Edward and Jane Williams became friends of the Shelleys at Pisa and lived with them in Lerici in 1822. Shelley liked to hear Jane sing and presented her with a guitar. A number of his last lyrics are addressed to her.

Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.

Original text: Percy Bysshe Shelley, Poetical Works, ed. Mary Shelley (London: E. Moxon, 1839). PR 5402 1870 ROBA.
First publication date: 1839
RPO poem editor: M. T. Wilson
RP edition: 3RP 2.603.
Recent editing: 4:2002/5/20

Composition date: 1822
Rhyme: abcabc

Other poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley

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