A Wish.
Oh, that I were the Spirit of a Plant,1
Rear’d in Imagination’s evergreen world,—2
To lift my head above the meadow grass,3
And strike my roots, far-spread and intervolved,4
Deep as the Central Heart, wherefrom to taste5
The springs of infinite being ! From that source6
What pregnant fermentations would arise ;7
What blossom, fruit, perfume, and influence ;8
To purify mankind’s destructive blood,—9
So full of life and elevating powers—10
So cloy’d and clogg’d for exercise of good.11