swift-fleeting

Updated: April 30, 2025

My own hounds' bayings that I loved before, As with them often o'er the purple hills I chased the flying hart from slope to slope, Before the slow sun climbed the eastern peaks, Until the swift sun smote the western plain; Whom often I had cheered by voice and glance, Whom often I had checked with hand and thong; Grim followers, like the passions, firing me, True servants, like the strong nerves, urging me On many a fruitless chase, to find and take Some too swift-fleeting beauty, faithful feet And tongues, obedient always: these I knew Clothed with a new-born force and vaster grown, And stronger than their master; and I thought, What if they tore me with their jaws, nor knew That once I ruled them, brute pursuing brute, And I the quarry?

Thomas Bulfinch - Bulfinch's Mythology: the Age of Fable