# The complete poetical works and letters of John Keats/Fancy

FANCY
Keats enclosed these lines, as lately written, in a letter to George and Georgiana Keats, January 2, 1819. He included the poem in the 1820 volume. Mr. John Knowles Paine has published a cantata for soprano solo, chorus, and orchestra, entitled The Realm of Fancy, using these lines for his book.
Ever let the Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home: At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth, Like to bubbles when rain pelteth; Then let winged Fancy wander Through the thought still spread beyond her: Open wide the mind's cage-door, She 'll dart forth, and cloudward soar. O sweet Fancy! let her loose; Summer's joys are spoilt by use,10 And the enjoying of the Spring Fades as does its blossoming; Autumn's red-lipp'd fruitage too, Blushing through the mist and dew, Cloys with tasting: What do then? Sit thee by the ingle, when The sear faggot blazes bright, Spirit of a winter's night; When the soundless earth is muffled, And the caked snow is shuffled20 From the ploughboy's heavy shoon; When the Night doth meet the Noon In a dark conspiracy To banish Even from her sky. Sit thee there, and send abroad, With a mind self-overawed, Fancy, high-commission'd:—send her! She has vassals to attend her: She will bring, in spite of frost, Beauties that the earth hath lost;30 She will bring thee, all together, All delights of summer weather; All the buds and bells of May, From dewy sward or thorny spray; All the heaped Autumn's wealth, With a still, mysterious stealth: She will mix these pleasures up Like three fit wines in a cup, And thou shalt quaff it:—thou shalt hear Distant harvest-carols clear;40 Rustle of the reaped corn; Sweet birds antheming the morn: And, in the same moment—hark! 'T is the early April lark, Or the rooks, with busy caw, Foraging for sticks and straw. Thou shalt, at one glance, behold The daisy and the marigold; White-plumed lilies, and the first Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst;50 Shaded hyacinth, alway Sapphire queen of the mid-May; And every leaf, and every flower Pearled with the self-same shower. Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep Meagre from its celled sleep; And the snake all winter-thin Cast on sunny bank its skin; Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see Hatching in the hawthorn-tree,60 When the hen-bird's wing doth rest Quiet on her mossy nest; ​Then the hurry and alarm When the bee-hive casts its swarm; Acorns ripe down-pattering While the autumn breezes sing.
Oh, sweet Fancy! let her loose; Every thing is spoilt by use; Where 's the cheek that doth not fade, Too much gazed at? Where 's the maid70 Whose lip mature is ever new? Where 's the eye, however blue, Doth not weary? Where 's the face One would meet in every place? Where 's the voice, however soft, One would hear so very oft? At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth Like to bubbles when rain pelteth. Let, then, winged Fancy find Thee a mistress to thy mind:80 Dulcet-eyed as Ceres' daughter Ere the God of Torment taught her How to frown and how to chide; With a waist and with a side White as Hebe's, when her zone Slipt its golden clasp, and down Fell her kirtle to her feet, While she held the goblet sweet, And Jove grew languid.—Break the mesh Of the Fancy's silken leash;90 Quickly break her prison-string, And such joys as these she 'll bring.— Let the winged Fancy roam, Pleasure never is at home.