The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley (ed. Hutchinson, 1914)/To Harriet

by Percy Bysshe Shelley

For works with similar titles, see To Harriet.

TO HARRIET

[Composed May, 1814. Published (from the Esdaile MSS.) by Dowden, Life of Shelley, 1887.]

Thy look of love has power to calmThe stormiest passion of my soul;Thy gentle words are drops of balmIn life's too bitter bowl;No grief is mine, but that alone 5These choicest blessings I have known.

Harriet! if all who long to liveIn the warm sunshine of thine eye,That price beyond all pain must give,—Beneath thy scorn to die; 10Then hear thy chosen own too lateHis heart most worthy of thy hate.

Be thou, then, one among mankindWhose heart is harder not for state,Thou only virtuous, gentle, kind, 15Amid a world of hate;And by a slight endurance sealA fellow-being's lasting weal.

For pale with anguish is his cheek.His breath comes fast, his eyes are dim, 20Thy name is struggling ere he speak,Weak is each trembling limb;In mercy let him not endureThe misery of a fatal cure.

Oh, trust for once no erring guide! 25Bid the remorseless feeling flee;'Tis malice, 'tis revenge, 'tis pride,'Tis anything but thee;Oh, deign a nobler pride to prove,And pity if thou canst not love. 30