Poem: The Scenic Part of Poetry by Charles Harpur

What's poetic, I ask, if a green Wood is not --
   A green Wood by balmy winds stirred?
And a Runnel that slides with a flash from its grot,
   And a trill like the song of a bird?
And we prize them when pictured by Poesy, more
   Than we did, when old outlying things,       
Because they are brought as it were to our door
   By the spells of the Bard while he sings.    

What's poetic I ask, if a Tempest is not,
   With its dragon-winds bellowing by,
And its thunder-flames seething out, hissingly hot.
   As from fissures and flaws in the sky?  
And we prize it, when pictured by Poesy, more  
   Than we did, when its terror was known,
Because its dread face looketh in at our door
   In its beauty and grandeur alone.

What's poetic, I ask, if the Ocean is not,
   Or in storm, or when calmly it sleeps,
Lying wide as the heaven whose face is begot
   Again in the womb of its deeps?  
And we prize it, when pictured by Poesy, more
   Than we did, when around us it wrought,
Because over thenceforth it lies at our door
   As a mighty possession of thought.

First published in The Empire, 28 October 1857