Ode on a Grecian Urn

Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness, Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time, Sylvan historian, who canst thus express A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape Of deities or mortals, or of both, In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? What men or gods are these? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on; Not to the sensual ear, but, more endeared, Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone: Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare; Bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss, Though winning near the goal—yet, do not grieve; She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss, Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

Ah, happy, happy boughs! That cannot shed Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu; And, when thy voice has ceased, and death is dead, Yet breathe in thy artificial tenderness; When old age shall this generation waste, Thou shalt remain, in midst of the beautiful, Whatever it on upon thy soul has cast.

Just as the everlasting, divine leaf: This is what nature offers without end,— A thing of beauty, an eternal sweet note: Preserved upon the flowing stillness of seed, Even in the silence of time.

• John Keats