Acrostic Quotes
Fox-Trot-9

18. John Keats 2

The poetry of earth is never dead:
His worth in rhyme outweighs the weight of Earth,
Extends beyond the reach of Nature's spread,

Pervades the world with life to quench its dearth.
Oblivion, you may devour his prime,
Engender on his face your fickle quill
To draw the lines of age, but stronger rhyme
Restores his fading looks and dares to kill
Your vile conspiracies against his life,

Offends at every chance your fading sway,
For poetry outlasts a world of strife,

Enduring all your plans to live each day.
Alive in rhyme, my love will live forever,
Resisting change towards the brink of never!
Though lacking all the rhyme that wit allows,
He stirs a woman's heart with rolling eyes,

Impresses women's souls with clever vows,
Supplying English wit with golden lies.

Nefarious becomes his growing crime,
Enslaving me in love and thus declaring
Verbatim every rhyme to sluttish time,
Endeavoring to try his wit in swearing.
Remember, love, when I am dead and gone,

Do not forget these rhymes that taught you love;
Endear these rhymes unto your children on
A special day, for rhyme can better prove:
Despite the fact that from this world I'm fled, 

The poetry of earth is never dead!
—John Keats

The poetry of earth is ceasing never:
His virtue (though defamed by many vices)
Erases all his sins in his endeavor,

Persisting well in deeds where each suffices.
O'er all the world he reigns in brilliant splendor,
Enlightening the depths of ignorance
That never once before had cause to render,
Revealing in themselves their relevance,
Yet more exalted still, himself the lender.

Of future men of honor, truth and kindness,
Forever shall he be the first example,

Exemplifying all the traits of greatness
Arising from his first and noble sample.
Respected for all time, respected I
To be the one that taught him how and why.
He lives in purity within mine eyes

If not within the eyes of jealous peers,
Since love subtracts the defects that arise,

Contracting each to less than it appears.
Each lie he tells is pardoned as a jest,
A mere inconsequence of slipping tongues,
Sufficient not to notice with the rest;
Indeed, my love is such that all his wrongs
Need not the sharp reprove of my detest.
Grant I the pardons love can oversee,

Nefarious as lies could ever seem,
Enduring each for love where love should be
Victorious, believing in a dream,
Endearing all his sins—but when alone,
Reserve myself for sorrow's sake my moan.

The poetry of earth is ceasing never.
—John Keats

(To be continued...)

A/N: You'll recognize half of this acrostic from the first one of Keats quote. It comes from his sonnet, 'On the Grasshopper and the Cricket'. The second quote comes from the same sonnet. And since these quotes came from a sonnet, I decided to make the rhyme scheme that of two sonnets, though that is not immediately clear due to the formatting. John Keats was a great experimenter on the sonnet form, so in the same spirit, this happens to be one of my more experimental acrostic quotes. Read, meditate, ponder, love, comment and vote, please... ( ^_^ )

Meter: Iambic pentameter
Rhyme Scheme: Shakespearian sonnet