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Home  »  The Oxford Book of English Verse  »  553. Time, Real and Imaginary AN ALLEGORY

Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 1772–1834

553. Time, Real and Imaginary AN ALLEGORY

ON the wide level of a mountain’s head 
(I knew not where, but ’twas some faery place), 
Their pinions, ostrich-like, for sails outspread, 
Two lovely children run an endless race, 
      A sister and a brother!         5
      This far outstripp’d the other; 
  Yet ever runs she with reverted face, 
  And looks and listens for the boy behind: 
      For he, alas! is blind! 
O’er rough and smooth with even step he pass’d,  10
And knows not whether he be first or last.