John Keats - Sonnet.—To The Nile lyrics

Son of the old moon-mountains African! Stream of the Pyramid and Crocodile! We call thee fruitful, and, that very while, A desert fills our seeing's inward span; Nurse of swart nations since the world began, Art thous so fruitful? or dost thou beguile Such men to honour thee, who, worn with toil, Rest them a space 'twist Cairo and Decan? O may dark fancies err!—they surely do; 'Tis ignorance that makes a barren waste Of all beyond itself. Thou dost bedew Green rushes like our rivers, and dost taste The pleasant sun-rise; green isles hast thou too, And to the sea as happily dost haste.