| Hunt and Lee, comps. The Book of the Sonnet. 1867. | | | | I. The Poet | | By James Gates Percival (1795–1856) |
| | | DEEP sunk in thought, he sat beside the river, | |
| Its wave in liquid lapses glided by, | |
| Nor watched, in crystal depth, his vacant eye | |
| The willow’s high o’erarching foliage quiver. | |
| From dream to shadowy dream returning ever, | 5 |
| He sat, like statue, on the grassy verge; | |
| His thoughts, a phantom train, in airy surge | |
| Streamed visionary onward, pausing never. | |
| As autumn wind, in mountain forest weaving | |
| Its wondrous tapestry of leaf and bower, | 10 |
| O’ermastering the night’s resplendent flower | |
| With tints, like hues of heaven, the eye deceiving; | |
| So, lost in labyrinthine maze, he wove | |
| A wreath of flowers; the golden thread was love. | | | | |
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