Toward a Bright Star

The glorious French poster

Bright star! would I were steadfast as thou art --
Not in lone splendor hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priest-like task
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors --
No -- yet still steadfast, still unchangable,
Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever -- or else swoon to death.

Written on a blank page in Shakespeare's poems, facing "A Lover's Complaint"
John Keats

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Yes, I'm seeing Jane Campion's Bright Star today.
Yes, I'm terribly excited.



Australian release date: 26 December 2009