All Nature seems at work. Slugs leave their lair— <br />The bees are stirring—birds are on the wing— <br />And Winter slumbering in the open air, <br />Wears on his smiling face a dream of Spring! <br />And I the while, the sole unbusy thing, <br />Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, nor sing. <br /> <br />Yet well I ken the banks where amaranths blow, <br />Have traced the fount whence streams of nectar flow. <br />Bloom, O ye amaranths! bloom for whom ye may, <br />For me ye bloom not! Glide, rich streams, away! <br />With lips unbrightened, wreathless brow, I stroll: <br />And would you learn the spells that drowse my soul? <br />Work without Hope draws nectar in a sieve, <br />And Hope without an object cannot live. <br /> <br />(composed 21st February 1825)<br /><br />Samuel Coleridge - Taylor<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/work-without-hope-2/
