2.

Yet, still, this fond bosom regrets while adoring,
That love, like the leaf, must fall into the sear,
That age will come on, when remembrance, deploring,
Contemplates the scenes of her youth with a tear;

3.

That the time must arrive, when, no longer retaining Their auburn, those locks must wave thin to the breeze, When a few silver hairs of those tresses remaining, Prove nature a prey to decay and disease.

4.

'Tis this, my beloved, which spreads gloom o'er my features,

Though I ne'er shall presume to arraign the decree Which God has proclaim'd as the fate of his creatures, In the death which one day will deprive you of me.

5.

Mistake not, sweet sceptic, the cause of emotion,
No doubt can the mind of your lover invade;
He worships each look with such faithful devotion,
A smile can enchant, or a tear can dissuade.

6.

But as death, my beloved, soon or late shall o'ertake us, And our breasts which alive with such sympathy glow, Will sleep in the grave till the blast shall awake us, When calling the dead, in earth's bosom laid low:

7.

Oh! then let us drain, while we may, draughts of pleasure, Which from passion like ours may unceasingly flow; Let us pass round the cup of love's bliss in full measure, And quaff the contents as our nectar below.

1805.

TO CAROLINE *.

1.

OH! when shall the grave hide for ever my sorrow? Oh, when shall my soul wing her flight from this clay? The present is hell, and the coming to-morrow

But brings, with new torture, the curse of to-day.

2.

From my eye flows no tear, from my lips fall no curses,
I blast not the fiends who have hurled me from bliss;
is the soul which bewailing rehearses
Its querulous grief, when in anguish like this.

For

poor

3.

Was my eye, 'stead of tears, with red fury flakes bright'ning,

Would my lips breathe a flame which no stream could assuage,

On our foes should my glance lanch in vengeance its lightning,

With transport my tongue give a loose to its rage.

* This poem also is reprinted from the private volume.-ED.

4.

But now tears and curses, alike unavailing,
Would add to the souls of our tyrants delight;
Could they view us our sad separation bewailing,
Their merciless hearts would rejoice at the sight.

5.

Yet still, though we bend with a feign'd resignation, Life beams not for us with one ray that can cheer; Love and hope upon earth bring no more consolation, In the grave is our hope, for in life is our fear.

6.

Oh! when, my adored, in the tomb will they place me, Since, in life, love and friendship for ever are fled? If again in the mansion of death I embrace thee, Perhaps they will leave unmolested the dead.

1805.

STANZAS TO A LADY,

WITH THE POEMS OF CAMOENS.

1.

THIS Votive pledge of fond esteem,
Perhaps, dear girl! for me thou'lt prize;
It sings of Love's enchanting dream,
A theme we never can despise.

2.

Who blames it but the envious fool,
The old and disappointed maid?

Or pupil of the prudish school,
In single sorrow doom'd to fade?

3.

Then read, dear girl! with feeling read,
For thou wilt ne'er be one of those;
To thee in vain I shall not plead
In pity for the poet's woes.

4.

He was in sooth a genuine bard;
His was no faint, fictitious flame:
Like his, may love be thy reward,

But not thy hapless fate the same,

AWAY with your fictions of flimsy romance!
†Those tissues of falsehood which folly has wove!
Give me the mild beam of the soul-breathing glance,
Or the rapture which dwells on the first kiss of love.

2.

Ye rhymers, whose bosoms with phantasy glow, Whose pastoral passions are made for the grove, From what blest inspiration your sonnets would flow, Could you ever have tasted the first kiss of love!

* These stanzas were printed in the private volume, and in the first edition of Hours of Idleness, but omitted in the second.-ED. +"Those tissues of fancy Moriah § has wove."-Private volume.

ED.

"Ye rhymers, who sing as if seated on snow,

Whose pastoral passions are made for the grove,
With what blest inspiration your sonnets would flow,
Could you ever have tasted the first kiss of love!"
Private volume.-ED.

VOL. V.

§" Moriah, the Goddess of Folly."

E