The complete poetical works and letters of John Keats/In Answer to a Sonnet ending thus

by John Keats

For other versions of this work, see Blue Eyes.

WRITTEN IN ANSWER TO A SONNET ENDING THUS:

'Dark eyes are dearer far
Than those that mock the hyacinthine bell'

By J. H. Reynolds.

Dated by Lord Houghton 'February, 1818,' in Life, Letters and Literary Remains, where it was first printed.

Blue! 'T is the life of heaven,—the domain
Of Cynthia,—the wide palace of the sun,—
The tent of Hesperus, and all his train,—
The bosomer of clouds, gold, gray, and dun.
Blue! 'T is the life of waters—ocean
And all its vassal streams, pools numberless,
May rage, and foam, and fret, but never can
Subside, if not to dark blue nativeness.
Blue! Gentle cousin of the forest-green,
Married to green in all the sweetest flowers,—
Forget-me-not,—the blue bell,—and, that queen
Of secrecy, the violet: what strange powers
Hast thou, as a mere shadow! But how great,
When in an Eye thou art, alive with fate!