Monday Poetry: Songs of Experience Introduction

The flip side to Blake's Songs of Innocence is his Songs of Experience.  It is fascinating to note the change in tone and topic from one to the other.  Here is his introduction, much more pensive and looking towards life's end rather than its beginning.


SONGS OF EXPERIENCE: INTRODUCTION
Hear the voice of the Bard!
Who Present, Past & Future sees,
Whose ears have heard
The Holy Word
That walk'd among the ancient trees,

Calling the lapsed Soul,
And weeping in the evening dew,
That might controll
The starry pole,
And fallen, fallen light renew!

'O Earth, O Earth return!
Night is worn,
And the morn
Rises from the slumbrous mass.

'Turn away no more.
Why wilt thou turn away?

The starry floor,
The wat'ry shore,
Is giv'n thee till the break of day.'