Poetry Thursday - a sonnet by John Keats

When I have Fears That I May Cease to Be

BY JOHN KEATS

When I have fears that I may cease to be 

   Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain, 

Before high-pilèd books, in charactery, 

   Hold like rich garners the full ripened grain; 

When I behold, upon the night’s starred face, 

   Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, 

And think that I may never live to trace 

   Their shadows with the magic hand of chance; 

And when I feel, fair creature of an hour, 

   That I shall never look upon thee more, 

Never have relish in the faery power 

   Of unreflecting love—then on the shore 

Of the wide world I stand alone, and think 

Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.

(via)

This is one of those poems you learn, or at least read, in school ... and years later you come upon it and wonder if you ever really understood it then, or do now.

I sometimes walk past Keats' house; built in 1814-15, it's now a museum, and the street is now named Keats Grove (formerly John Street, or Albion Grove). During Keats' time there (1818-20), it was one of a pair of semi-detached houses known as Wentworth House, which were joined in 1838-9.

The parlour

Painted by Joseph Severn, 1821-23

Severn travelled with Keats to Rome; the portrait above was started by Severn in 1821, after Keats' death from tuberculosis, and finished in 1823. It is a recreation of Keats in one of his favourite poses, reading in his sitting room.