Aplolgia Pro Vita Sua

The poet in his lone yet genial hour

Gives to his eyes a magnifying power :

Or rather he emancipates his eyes

From the black shapeless accidents of size—

In unctuous cones of kindling coal,

Or smoke upwreathing from the pipe's trim bole,

    His gifted ken can see

    Phantoms of sublimity.

August 28, 1800.

Published in 1822.