Rid of the world's injustice and its pain,
He rests at last beneath God's veil of blue;
Taken from life while life and love were new
The youngest of the martyrs here is lain,
Fair as Sebastian and as foully slain.
No cypress shades his grave, nor funeral yew,
But red-lipped daisies, violets drenched with dew,
And sleepy poppies, catch the evening rain.
O proudest heart that broke for misery!
O saddest poet that the world hath seen!
O sweetest singer of the English land!
Thy name was writ in water on the sand,
But our tears shall keep thy memory green,
And make it flourish like a Basil-tree.
_Rome_, 1877.
_Note_.--A later version of this sonnet, under the title of 'The Grave of
Keats,' is given in the _Poems_, page 157.
KEATS'S SONNET ON BLUE
(_Century Guild Hobby Horse_, July 1886.)
During my tour in America I happened one evening to find myself in
Louisville, Kentucky. The subject I had selected to speak on was the
Mission of Art in the Nineteenth Century, and in the course of my lecture
I had occasion to quote Keats's Sonnet on Blue as an example of the
poet's delicate sense of colour-harmonies. When my lecture was concluded
there came round to see me a lady of middle age, with a sweet gentle
manner and a most musical voice. She introduced herself to me as Mrs.
Speed, the daughter of George Keats, and invited me to come and examine
the Keats manuscripts in her possession. I spent most of the next day
with her, reading the letters of Keats to her father, some of which were
at that time unpublished, poring over torn yellow leaves and faded scraps
of paper, and wondering at the little Dante in which Keats had written
those marvellous notes on Milton. Some months afterwards, when I was in
California, I received a letter from Mrs. Speed asking my acceptance of
the original manuscript of the sonnet which I had quoted in my lecture.
This manuscript I have had reproduced here, as it seems to me to possess
much psychological interest. It shows us the conditions that preceded
the perfected form, the gradual growth, not of the conception but of the
expression, and the workings of that spirit of selection which is the
secret of style. In the case of poetry, as in the case of the other
arts, what may appear to be simply technicalities of method are in their
essence spiritual not mechanical, and although, in all lovely work, what
concerns us is the ultimate form, not the conditions that necessitate
that form, yet the preference that precedes perfection, the evolution of
the beauty, and the mere making of the music, have, if not their artistic
value, at least their value to the artist.
It will be remembered that this sonnet was first published in 1848 by
Lord Houghton in his _Life_, _Letters_, _and Literary Remains of John
Keats_. Lord Houghton does not definitely state where he found it, but
it was probably among the Keats manuscripts belonging to Mr. Charles
Brown. It is evidently taken from a version later than that in my
possession, as it accepts all the corrections, and makes three
variations. As in my manuscript the first line is torn away, I give the
sonnet here as it appears in Lord Houghton's edition.