Music

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Title:     Music
Author: Samuel Taylor Coleridge [More Titles by Coleridge]

Hence, soul-dissolving Harmony
That lead'st th' oblivious soul astray--
Though thou sphere-descended be--
Hence away!--
Thou mightier Goddess, thou demand'st my lay,
Born when earth was seiz'd with cholic;
Or as more sapient sages say,
What time the Legion diabolic
Compell'd their beings to enshrine
In bodies vile of herded swine,
Precipitate adown the steep
With hideous rout were plunging in the deep,
And hog and devil mingling grunt and yell
Seiz'd on the ear with horrible obtrusion;--
Then if aright old legendaries tell,
Wert thou begot by Discord on Confusion!

What though no name's sonorous power
Was given thee at thy natal hour!--
Yet oft I feel thy sacred might,
While concords wing their distant flight.
Such Power inspires thy holy son
Sable clerk of Tiverton!
And oft where Otter sports his stream,
I hear thy banded offspring scream.
Thou Goddess! thou inspir'st each throat;
'Tis thou who pour'st the scritch-owl note!
Transported hear'st thy children all
Scrape and blow and squeak and squall;
And while old Otter's steeple rings,
Clappest hoarse thy raven wings!

1791.

[The end]
Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem: Music

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