My soul is an enchanted boat / Percy Bysshe Shelley

from Prometheus Unbound:

Asia:
    My soul is an enchanted boat,
    Which, like a sleeping swan, doth float
Upon the silver waves of thy sweet singing;
    And thine doth like an angel sit
    Beside a helm conducting it,
Whilst all the winds with melody are ringing.
    It seems to float ever, forever,    
    Upon that many-winding river,
    Between mountains, woods, abysses,
    A paradise of wildernesses!
Till, like one in slumber bound,
Borne to the ocean, I float down, around,
Into a sea profound of ever-spreading sound.

    Meanwhile thy spirit lifts its pinions
    In music's most serene dominions;
Catching the winds that fan that happy heaven.
    And we sail on, away, afar,
    Without a course, without a star,
But, by the instinct of sweet music driven;
    Till through Elysian garden islets
    By thee most beautiful of pilots,
    Where never mortal pinnace glided,
    The boat of my desire is guided;
Realms where the air we breathe is love,
Which in the winds on the waves doth move,
Harmonizing this earth with what we feel above.

    We have passed Age's icy caves,
    And Manhood's dark and tossing waves,
And Youth's smooth ocean, smiling to betray;
    Beyond the glassy gulfs we flee
    Of shadow-peopled Infancy,
Through Death and Birth, to a diviner day;
    A paradise of vaulted bowers
    Lit by downward-gazing flowers,
    And watery paths that wind between
    Wildernesses calm and green,
Peopled by shapes too bright to see,
And rest, having beheld; somewhat like thee;
Which walk upon the sea, and chant melodiously!

~~
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)
from Prometheus Unbound, with other poems, 1820

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Percy Bysshe Shelley biography

"My soul is an enchanted boat" read by Vincent Price. Courtesy Vincent Price - Topic.