{
 "id": "phillis-wheatley/on-imagination",
 "title": "On Imagination",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Phillis Wheatley",
 "poet_slug": "phillis-wheatley",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral",
 "book_slug": "poems-on-various-subjects-religious-and-moral",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 19,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1773,
  "venue": "Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (1773)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://github.com/standardebooks/phillis-wheatley_poems-on-various-subjects-religious-and-moral"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/phillis-wheatley_poems-on-various-subjects-religious-and-moral",
  "file": "poems-on-various-subjects-religious-and-moral.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/409",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsonvarioussu273whea",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsofphilliswh00whea_1"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-14"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 53,
  "n_stanzas": 7,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 53,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Thy various works, imperial queen, we see,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "How bright their forms! how deck’d with pomp by thee!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy wond’rous acts in beauteous order stand,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And all attest how potent is thine hand.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "From Helicon’s refulgent heights attend,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Ye sacred choir, and my attempts befriend:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To tell her glories with a faithful tongue,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ye blooming graces, triumph in my song.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Now here, now there, the roving Fancy flies,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Till some lov’d object strikes her wand’ring eyes,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whose silken fetters all the senses bind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And soft captivity involves the mind.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Imagination! who can sing thy force?",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Or who describe the swiftness of thy course?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Soaring through air to find the bright abode,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Th’ empyreal palace of the thund’ring God,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We on thy pinions can surpass the wind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And leave the rolling universe behind:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From star to star the mental optics rove,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Measure the skies, and range the realms above.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There in one view we grasp the mighty whole,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or with new worlds amaze th’ unbounded soul.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Though Winter frowns to Fancy’s raptur’d eyes",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The fields may flourish, and gay scenes arise;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The frozen deeps may break their iron bands,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And bid their waters murmur o’er the sands.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fair Flora may resume her fragrant reign,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And with her flow’ry riches deck the plain;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sylvanus may diffuse his honours round,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And all the forest may with leaves be crown’d:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Show’rs may descend, and dews their gems disclose,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And nectar sparkle on the blooming rose.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Such is thy pow’r, nor are thine orders vain,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "O thou the leader of the mental train:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In full perfection all thy works are wrought,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And thine the sceptre o’er the realms of thought.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before thy throne the subject-passions bow,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of subject-passions sov’reign ruler Thou;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "At thy command joy rushes on the heart,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And through the glowing veins the spirits dart.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Fancy might now her silken pinions try",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To rise from earth, and sweep th’ expanse on high;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From Tithon’s bed now might Aurora rise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Her cheeks all glowing with celestial dies,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "While a pure stream of light o’erflows the skies.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The monarch of the day I might behold,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And all the mountains tipt with radiant gold,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But I reluctant leave the pleasing views,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which Fancy dresses to delight the Muse;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Winter austere forbids me to aspire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And northern tempests damp the rising fire;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They chill the tides of Fancy’s flowing sea,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cease then, my song, cease the unequal lay.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}