They stand here like a regiment at ease,

Gold-lettered on the black and red and blue,

Waiting for me to read them back to life

Or shift their ranks to make their honor new.

Their pied and peaceful colors wall the room.

Their titles tell me every passionate ghost

And every blowing landscape shut inside

With words to hold them there, and poetry most.

Herrick with Saki, Donne with old George Moore,

Here, as in heaven, find themselves set down.

Troilus and Tristram Shandy lean one way.

Here Xanadu lies close to Tilbury Town.

Bennett and Chaucer, Boswell, Pepys, and Proust

Have come here for the journey's own good sake.

They crowd so close that time is crowded out.

A burning Tyger walks with William Blake.

Valiant-for-Truth climbs up the farther shore

And is with Hamlet and Lord Jim well met.

The wind blows through the willows with a sang

That Shakespeare heard and Keats could not forget.

Here, though my spirit darken or grow strange

With restlessness, and in the dark seem blind,

The books will wait: they lift more life to me

Than I shall ever leave this room to find.