THE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, VOL. 8 (Completed)

"DESPONDING FATHER! MARK THIS ALTERED BOUGH"

Composed 1835.--Published 1835

One of the "Miscellaneous Sonnets."--ED.

Desponding Father! mark this altered bough,[49]

So beautiful of late, with sunshine warmed,

Or moist with dews; what more unsightly now,

Its blossoms shrivelled, and its fruit, if formed,

Invisible? yet Spring her genial brow

Knits not o'er that discolouring and decay

As false to expectation. Nor fret thou

At like unlovely process in the May

Of human life: a Stripling's graces blow,

Fade and are shed, that from their timely fall

(Misdeem it not a cankerous change) may grow

Rich mellow bearings, that for thanks shall call:

In all men, sinful is it to be slow

To hope----in Parents, sinful above all.

[49] Compare The Excursion (book iii. l. 649), and the sonnet (vol.vi. p. 72) beginning----

Surprised by joy----impatient as the Wind.

ED.