Richard Monckton Milnes - Impression on Returning to England lyrics

In just accordance with attentive sight, Through airy space and round our planet ball, The inorganic world is voiced with light, And colours are the words it speaks withal. Thus has my eye had glad experience Of that most perfect utterance and clear tone With which all visible things address the sense, In lands retiring from the northern zone. But oh! in what poor language, faintly caught, Do the old features of my England greet Her stranger-son--how powerless, how unmeet For the free vision Italy had taught What to expect from nature; I must scan Her face, I fear, no more, and look alone to man.