Dungeon, The
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
[from his play Osorio, later called Remorse]
Song
(Act V, scene i)
And this place our forefathers made for man !
This is the process of our Love and Wisdom,
To each poor brother who offends against us--
Most innocent, perhaps--and what if guilty ?
Is this the only cure ? Merciful God !
Each pore and natural outlet shrivell'd up
By Ignorance and parching Poverty,
His energies roll back upon his heart,
And stagnate and corrupt ; till chang'd to poison,
They break out on him, like a loathsome plague-spot ;
Then we call in our pamper'd mountebanks--
And this is their best cure ! uncomforted
And friendless Solitude, Groaning and Tears,
And savage Faces, at the clanking hour,
Seen through the steams and vapour of his dungeon,
By the lamp's dismal twilight ! So he lies
Circled with evil, till his very soul
Unmoulds its essence, hopelessly deform'd
By sights of ever more deformity !
With other ministrations thou, O Nature !
Healest thy wandering and distemper'd child :
Thou pourest on him thy soft influences,
Thy sunny hues, fair forms, and breathing sweets,
Thy melodies of woods, and winds, and waters,
Till he relent, and can no more endure
To be a jarring and a dissonant thing,
Amid this general dance and minstrelsy ;
But, bursting into tears, wins back his way,
His angry spirit heal'd and harmoniz'd
By the benignant touch of Love and Beauty.
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Here Are Our Top Love Poems...
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I Would Live in Your Love
by Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)
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Sonnet From the Portuguese V
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-61)
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The Bungler
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Blue and White
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Desideria
by William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
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The Taxi
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Song
by Sir William Watson (1858-1935)
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To a Butterfly
by William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
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Sonnet From the Portuguese V
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-61)
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She Tells Her Love by Robert Ranke Graves
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I Never Lost As Much by Emily Dickinson
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Heart, We Will Forget Him by Emily Dickinson
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O Mistress Mine by William Shakespeare
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Love by Robert Browning
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My Pretty Rose Tree by William Blake
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I Should Not Dare by Emily Dickinson
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One Day I Wrote Her Name by Edmund Spenser
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Tell me not, Sweet, by Richard Lovelace
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The Dream by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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The Dream by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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Hope is a Thing With Feathers by Emily Dickinson
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We Are Seven by William Wordsworth
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Mag by Carl Sandburg
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Ebb by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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I Sing by Emily Dickinson
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For Each Ecstatic Instant by Emily Dickinson
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Love Not Me by John Wilbye
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Mild Is The Parting Year by Walter Savage Landor