I had brought a box of small candles for just such an emergency. I lit one after the other, sat on the seat, and read Keats all night ... in an ecstasy, forgetting my surroundings, my pitiful poverty, my pilgrimage that would seem ridiculous to most.
The rain increased. Outside it drummed and drummed. Inside it dripped and dripped.
And as I sat there, upright, to escape the drip from the leaks, I climbed to a high, crystal-clear state of spirit.
Again I burned through Keats' life as if remembering that it was what I had myself suffered ... as if suddenly I awoke to the realisation that I was Keats, re-born in America, a tramp-student in Kansas....
And now Severn, my true, faithful friend, was with me.... Severn, who had given up his career as painter to be near me in my last days ... we were on the Maria Crowther ... we were still off the coast of England, and I had gone ashore for the last touching of my foot on English soil....
There hung the great, translucent star of evening, at that hushed moment of twilight, before any other of the stars had come forth....
"Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art—
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night,
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,