Rome-Sickness + 

To daily tasks we set our hand, + 

And oft the spirit, pent at home, + 

Breaks out and longs for Switzerland, + 

Longs oftener yet and pines for Rome. + 

I pass’d to-day o’er Walton Heath⁠— + 

The coming spring-time’s earliest stir + 

Quickened and moved, a happy breath, + 

In moss, and gorse, and shining fir. + 

Fortunate firs! who never think + 

How firs less curst by Fortune’s frown + 

O’er Glion fringe the mountain’s brink, + 

Or dot the slopes to Vevey down. + 

I cross’d St. George’s Hill to-day⁠— + 

There in the leaf-strewn copse I found + 

The tender foxglove-plants display + 

Their first green muffle on the ground. + 

They envy not, this tranquil brood, + 

The cyclamens whose blossoms fill + 

With fragrance all Frascati’s wood + 

Along the gracious Alban Hill! + 

Man only, with eternal bent + 

To come and go, to shift and range, + 

At life and living not content, + 

Chafes in his place, and pines for change. + 

Yet happy⁠—since his feverish blood + 

Leaves him no rest, and change he will⁠— + 

When restlessness is restless good, + 

Still mending, lessening, human ill! + 

Unwearied, as from land to land + 

The incessant wanderer takes his way, + 

To hold the light and reach the hand + 

To all who sink, to all who stray! + 