RPO -- William Wordsworth : Mutability

William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

Mutability

1From low to high doth dissolution climb,

2And sink from high to low, along a scale

3Of awful notes, whose concord shall not fail;

4A musical but melancholy chime,

5Which they can hear who meddle not with crime,

6Nor avarice, nor over-anxious care.

7Truth fails not; but her outward forms that bear

8The longest date do melt like frosty rime,

9That in the morning whitened hill and plain

10And is no more; drop like the tower sublime

11Of yesterday, which royally did wear

12His crown of weeds, but could not even sustain

13Some casual shout that broke the silent air,

14Or the unimaginable touch of Time.

Notes

1] This is from a series of 132 sonnets mostly written in 1821. "It struck me that certain points in the Ecclesiastical History of our Country might advantageously be presented to view in verse. Accordingly, I took up the subject, and what I now offer to the reader was the result" (Wordsworth, with reference to the whole series). In later editions these poems were known as Ecclesiastical Sonnets.

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: William Wordsworth, Ecclesiastical Sketches (1822).
First publication date: 1822
RPO poem editor: J. R. MacGillivray
RP edition: 3RP 2.398.
Recent editing: 2:2002/3/20

Composition date: 1821
Rhyme: abbaaccadefdfe

Other poems by William Wordsworth