Wild wingèd thing, O brought I know not whence

To beat your life out in my life’s low cage;

You strange familiar, nearer than my flesh

Yet distant as a star, that were at first

A child with me a child, yet elfin-far,

And visibly of some unearthly breed;

Mirthfullest mate of all my mortal games,

Yet shedding on them some evasive gleam

Of Latmian loneliness—O even then

Expert to lift the latch of our low door