Morning Meditations.

Let Taylor preach upon a morning breezy

How well to rise while nights and larks¹ are flying —

For my part getting up seems not so easy

By half as lying.

What if the lark² does carol in the sky,

Soaring beyond the sight to find him out —

Wherefore am I to rise at such a fly?

I’m not a trout³.

Talk not to me of bees and such like hums,

The smell of sweet herbs at the morning prime —

Only lee long enough, and bed becomes

A bed of time.

To me Dan Phoebus and his car are nought⁴,

His steeds that paw impatiently about —

Let them enjoy, say I, as horses ought,

The first turn-out!

Right beautiful the dewy meads appear

Besprinkled by the rosy-finger’d girl;

What then — if I prefer my pillow-beer

To early pearl?

My stomach is not ruled by other men’s,

And grumbling⁵ for a reason, quaintly⁶ begs

“Wherefore should master rise before the hens

Have laid their eggs?”

Why from a comfortable pillow start

To see faint flushes in the east awaken⁷?

A fig⁸, say I, for any streaky part,

Excepting bacon.

An early riser Mr. Gray has drawn⁹,

Who used to haste the dewy grass among,

“To meet the sun upon the upland lawn”—

Well — he died young.

With charwomen such early hours agree,

And sweeps, that earn betimes their bit and sup;

But I’m no climbing boy, and need not be

“All up — all up!”

So here I’ll lie, my morning calls deferring¹⁰,

Till something nearer to the stroke of noon; —

A man that’s fond precociously¹¹ of stirring,

Must be a spoon.

1 larks   

n.百灵科鸟（尤指云雀）( lark的名词复数 )；一大早就起床；鸡鸣即起；（因太费力而不想干时说）算了v.百灵科鸟（尤指云雀）( lark的第三人称单数 )；一大早就起床；鸡鸣即起；（因太费力而不想干时说）算了

参考例句：

• Maybe if she heard the larks sing she'd write. 玛丽听到云雀的歌声也许会写信的。 来自名作英译部分
• But sure there are no larks in big cities. 可大城市里哪有云雀呢。” 来自名作英译部分

2 lark   

n.云雀，百灵鸟；n.嬉戏，玩笑；vi.嬉戏

参考例句：

• He thinks it cruel to confine a lark in a cage.他认为把云雀关在笼子里太残忍了。
• She lived in the village with her grandparents as cheerful as a lark.她同祖父母一起住在乡间非常快活。

3 trout   

n.鳟鱼；鲑鱼(属)

参考例句：

• Thousands of young salmon and trout have been killed by the pollution.成千上万的鲑鱼和鳟鱼的鱼苗因污染而死亡。
• We hooked a trout and had it for breakfast.我们钓了一条鳟鱼，早饭时吃了。

4 nought   

n.／adj.无，零

参考例句：

• We must bring their schemes to nought.我们必须使他们的阴谋彻底破产。
• One minus one leaves nought.一减一等于零。

5 grumbling   

adj. 喃喃鸣不平的, 出怨言的

参考例句：

• She's always grumbling to me about how badly she's treated at work. 她总是向我抱怨她在工作中如何受亏待。
• We didn't hear any grumbling about the food. 我们没听到过对食物的抱怨。

6 quaintly   

adv.古怪离奇地

参考例句：

• "I don't see what that's got to do with it,'said the drummer quaintly. “我看不出这和你的事有什么联系，"杜洛埃说道，他感到莫名其妙。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹
• He is quaintly dressed, what a strange one he is. 他一身的奇装异服，真是另类！

7 awaken   

vi.醒，觉醒；vt.唤醒，使觉醒，唤起，激起

参考例句：

• Old people awaken early in the morning.老年人早晨醒得早。
• Please awaken me at six.请于六点叫醒我。

8 fig   

n.无花果(树)

参考例句：

• The doctor finished the fig he had been eating and selected another.这位医生吃完了嘴里的无花果，又挑了一个。
• You can't find a person who doesn't know fig in the United States.你找不到任何一个在美国的人不知道无花果的。

9 drawn   

v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的

参考例句：

• All the characters in the story are drawn from life.故事中的所有人物都取材于生活。
• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside.她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。

10 deferring   

v.拖延，延缓，推迟( defer的现在分词 )；服从某人的意愿，遵从

参考例句：

• Recently, the Supreme Court has focused on an additional reason for deferring to administrative agencies. 最近，最高法院强调了尊重行政机构的另一种理由。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法
• Think of it as deferring part of the compiler's job to runtime. 可以认为这是将编译器的部分工作延迟到了运行时。 来自互联网

11 precociously   

Precociously

参考例句：

• Her child behaves precociously. 她孩子显得有点早熟。 来自互联网
• It'seems generally true, too, that the aptitude for abstract thinking is developing precociously. 通常，似乎抽象思考的能力也过早地发展起来了。 来自互联网