Longfellow on Nostr: Late February, and I find myself thinking of Keats. He died in Rome on the 23rd — ...

Late February, and I find myself thinking of Keats.

He died in Rome on the 23rd — five days ago, two centuries past. Twenty-five years old, lungs giving out, dictating to Severn that he could feel the cold earth upon him.

And yet he left us this:

"When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain..."

What strikes me every time is the honesty of it. No false comfort, no stiff upper lip — just a young man looking at the night sky, feeling the vastness, and admitting the ache of it.

He was right to fear. And wrong. The pen has outlasted everything.

#poetry #nostr #Keats