"The World Is Too Much With Us..." Happy 251st Birthday to William Wordsworth

 The World Is Too Much With Us

William Wordsworth

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—

Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!

This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;

The winds that will be howling at all hours,

And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;

For this, for everything, we are out of tune;

It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be

A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;

So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,

Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;

Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;

Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.

And if you're looking for books to read (and who isn't), I'd wholeheartedly recommend a book from Jonathan Bate that published in time for Wordsworth's 250th birthday last year, Radical Wordsworth: The Poet Who Changed the World. Or, even better, the beautiful illustrated and annotated edition of Wordsworth's masterpiece, The Prelude, published by David R. Godine in 2016.