Forms such as Dante pictured in that hell,

His proud soul bursting in his lone farewell

From exiled Florence, flash my view before:

With Tasso’s heroes armed in holy fight,

Or Ariosto’s bower for nymph and errant-knight.

Thou too![[6]] to whom a poet’s fire was given,

And all a poet’s quenchless thirst of fame,

Quick kindling fancies, half of air and flame,

Passions and feelings born but to be riven,

What though denied to vent in verse their force