3 October 2026
(18 March 2016) Returning to the poems and poets that have influenced our own poetry, we recall that we were looking at John Keats and his direct influence on the formation of our Ode to a Stump Farm collection. One of Keats’ odes, written in 1819 and, according to his own words, all, except one, were written hastily, without much labor, in one of those creative moments we all experience. We note that the word ‘melancholy,’ was used in the 19th century to refer to moods that we now characterize as depression. Here is this ode, on melancholy:
Ode on Melancholy
No, no! go not to Lethe, neither twist
Wolf’s-bane, tight-rooted, for its poisonous wine;
Nor suffer thy pale forehead to be kissed
By nightshade, ruby grape of Proserpine;
Make not your rosary of yew-berries,
Nor let the beetle nor the death-moth be
Your mournful Psyche, nor the downy owl
A partner in your sorrow’s mysteries;
For shade to shade will come too drowsily,
And drown the wakeful anguish of the soul.
‘Lethe’ was the river of forgetfulness, bordering Hades; further, all these images are related to death, to which melancholy often led. Here the poet tries to ward off the descent into melancholy by refusing to accept these symbols.
But when the melancholy fit shall fall
Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud,
That fosters the droop-headed flowers all,
And hides the green hill in an April shroud;
Then glut thy sorrow on a morning rose,
Or on the rainbow of the salt sand-wave,
Or on the wealth of globed peonies;
Or if thy mistress some rich anger shows,
Emprison [Imprison] her soft hand, and let her rave,
And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes.
Interesting to note that melancholy comes suddenly, falling upon the poet “like a weeping cloud.” The poet continues to resist, here by focusing on beautiful things: flowers, green hills, roses, rainbows, etc., all of which are ‘dimmed’ by the ‘weeping cloud.’ His further attempt to resist involve calming his angry mistress, by holding her hand and gazing into her eyes.
She dwells with Beauty — Beauty that must die;
And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips
Bidding adieu; and aching Pleasure nigh,
Turning to poison while the bee-mouth sips;
Ay, in the very temple of delight
Veiled Melancholy has her sovran [sovereign] shrine,
Though seen of none save him whose strenuous tongue
Can burst Joy’s grape against his palate fine;
His soul shall taste the sadness of her might,
And be among her cloudy trophies hung.
There is a shift here, and a personification of melancholy as a priestess of her own shrine, over which she rules, and into which the poet is inexorably drawn. In the end he becomes one of her trophies, as the poet cannot resist her ‘charms,’ an odd way of seeing depression, but perhaps a method of coping. In the poet’s mental landscape, he can ‘leave’ her shrine, although he feels drawn back, and he can close the door in an effort to keep from entering this depressed place again. More next time! Good reading!
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