Time & Brevity

Sonnet XLV: On Leaving a Part of Sussex

by Charlotte Smith 1749–1806

From Elegiac Sonnets, and Other Poems (1800)

Time & BrevityNature

Farewel, Aruna!—on whose varied shore
My early vows were paid to Nature's shrine,
When thoughtless joy, and infant hope were mine,
And whose lorn stream has heard me since deplore
Too many sorrows! Sighing I resign
Thy solitary beauties—and no more
Or on thy rocks, or in thy woods recline,
Or on the heath, by moonlight lingering, pore
On air-drawn phantoms—While in Fancy's ear,
As in the evening wind thy murmurs swell,
The Enthusiast of the Lyre who wander'd here,
Seems yet to strike his visionary shell,
Of power to call forth Pity's tenderest tear,
Or wake wild Phrenzy—from her hideous cell!

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A farewell to the Arun, where her early vows were paid to Nature, written on leaving a place that had given her 'infant hope'.

MLA

Smith, Charlotte. “Sonnet XLV: On Leaving a Part of Sussex.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/smith/14/.

Chicago

Smith, Charlotte. “Sonnet XLV: On Leaving a Part of Sussex.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/smith/14/.

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