John Keats: Collected Lyrics
32 / 67
Public-domain lyrics

On the Elgin Marbles

John Keats

“On the Elgin Marbles” as printed in The Poetical Works of John Keats (1884).

John Keats: Collected Lyrics Text 32 1884 · historical text
Public domainSong lyricsRomantic
Complete public-domain lyrics

This text comes from The Poetical Works of John Keats, a historical songbook transcribed on Wikisource and reproduced from the pinned revision linked below.

Verse 1

My spirit is too weak; mortality

Weighs heavily on me like unwilling sleep,

And each imagined pinnacle and steep

Of godlike hardship tells me I must die

Like a sick eagle looking at the sky.

Yet 'tis a gentle luxury to weep,

That I have not the cloudy winds to keep

Fresh for the opening of the morning's eye.

Such dim-conceived glories of the brain,

Bring round the heart an indescribable feud;

So do these wonders a most dizzy pain,

That mingles Grecian grandeur with the rude

Wasting of old Time—with a billowy main,

A sun, a shadow of a magnitude.

Credits

Written by John Keats

Words by John Keats. Historical text published in The Poetical Works of John Keats (1884); public domain. No claim to a modern recording or arrangement.

Source & text edition

The Poetical Works of John Keats (1884), “On the Elgin Marbles”

Every text in this 1884 collected edition is by John Keats (1795-1821), who died more than 200 years ago, so the text is in the public domain worldwide; the edition carries a Wikisource PD-old determination.

How to read this historical text and its source

Read the source on Wikisource

View copyright evidence · Transcription terms (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Retrieved 2026-10-27. Line spacing and section labels are adapted for reading. The displayed text follows the linked edition. Editorial notes and abstract artwork are by 52lyrics.
Keep tracing

More from John Keats: Collected Lyrics.

01A PortraitPublic-domain lyrics02A Reminiscence of Claude's Enchanted CastlePublic-domain lyrics03A Spenserian StanzaPublic-domain lyrics04An Earlier Version of "HyperionPublic-domain lyrics