When I have fears that I may cease to be
John Keats’ poem “When I have Fears that I may Cease to Be” was written between 22 and 31 January 1818. It was published (posthumously) in 1848 in “Life, Letters, and Literary Remains, of John Keats”.
John Keats was born on 31 October 1795 in London, England, and he died on 23 February 1821 in Rome, Papal States, at the age of 25.Keats was an English poet of the second generation of Romantic poets, with Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley. His poems had been in publication for less than four years when he died of tuberculosis at the age of 25. They were indifferently received in his lifetime, but his fame grew rapidly after his death.
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Wikipedia page on “When I have fears that I may cease to be”
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Wikipedia page on John Keats
When I have fears that I may cease to be Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain, Before high-pilèd books, in charactery, Hold like rich garners the full ripened grain; When I behold, upon the night’s starred face, Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, And think that I may never live to trace Their shadows with the magic hand of chance; And when I feel, fair creature of an hour, That I shall never look upon thee more, Never have relish in the faery power Of unreflecting love — then on the shore Of the wide world I stand alone, and think Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.