POETRY ON THE LAKE

England in 1819

An old, mad, blind, despised, and dying king,-
Princes, the dregs of their dull race, who flow
Through public scorn, mud from a muddy spring,-
Rulers who neither see, nor feel, nor know,
But leech-like to their fainting country cling,
Till they drop, blind in blood, without a blow,-
A people starved and stabbed in the untilled field,-
An army which liberticide and prey
Makes as a two-edged sword to all who wield,-
Golden and sanguine laws which tempt and slay;
Religion Christless, Godless, a book sealed,-
A Senate—Time’s worst statute unrepealed,-
Are graves from which a glorious Phantom may
Burst to illumine our tempestuous day.

Shelley