by Keats · Cluster: Crown · Pride · Fortune’s Wheel
Abstract
A hymn to Delphic Apollo, the speaker fearing he is a worm presuming to wear the laurel and dreading the Thunderer’s wrath; classical myth, the god of song, humility and ambition.
Connections
Motifs: Crown, Stars, Storm Themes & Concepts: Humility, Ambition Forms & Genres: Hymn Historical References: Greek Mythology Characters: Apollo
Testo integrale / Full text
God of the golden bow,
And of the golden lyre,
And of the golden hair,
And of the golden fire,
Charioteer
Of the patient year,
Where - where slept thine ire,
When like a blank idiot I put on thy wreath,
Thy laurel, thy glory,
The light of thy story, 10
Or was I a worm - too low crawling, for death?
O Delphic Apollo!
The Thunderer grasp’d and grasp’d,
The Thunderer frown’d and frown’d;
The eagle’s feathery mane
For wrath became stiffen’d - the sound
Of breeding thunder
Went drowsily under,
Muttering to be unbound.
O why didst thou pity, and for a worm
20
Why touch thy soft lute
Till the thunder was mute,
Why was not I crush’d - such a pitiful germ?
O Delphic Apollo!
The Pleiades were up,
Watching the silent air;
The seeds and roots in the Earth
Were swelling for summer fare;
The Ocean, its neighbour,
Was at its old labour,
30
When, who - who did dare
To tie, like a madman, thy plant round his brow.
And grin and look proudly,
And blaspheme so loudly,
And live for that honour, to stoop to thee now?
O Delphic Apollo!