Poems (1828) | Page 5

fears, she envies, and she loves;?Owns all sensations that deride the span,?And eternize the little life of man!
ROSA'S GRAVE.
It is a mournful pleasure to remember the exquisite taste and delight she evinced in the arrangement of a Bouquet; and how often she wished that, hereafter, she might appear to me as a beautiful flower!
Oh! lay me where my Rosa lies,?And love shall o'er the moss-grown bed,?When dew-drops leave the weeping skies.?His tenderest tear of pity shed.
And sacred shall the willow be,?That shades the spot where virtue sleeps;?And mournful memory weep to see?The hallow'd watch affection keeps.
Yes, soul of love! this bleeding heart?Scarce beating, soon its griefs shall cease;?Soon from his woes the sufferer part,?And hail thee at the Throne of Peace
THE SIBYL.
A SKETCH.
So stood the Sibyl: stream'd her hoary hair?Wild as the blast, and with a comet's glare?Glow'd her red eye-balls 'midst the sunken gloom?Of their wild orbs, like death-fires in a tomb.?Slow, like the rising storm, in fitful moans,?Broke from her breast the deep prophetic tones.?Anon, with whirlwind rash, the Spirit came;?Then in dire splendour, like imprison'd flame?Flashing through rifted domes or towns amazed,?Her voice in thunder burst; her arm she raised;?Outstretch'd her hands, as with a Fury's force,?To grasp, and launch the slow descending curse:?Still as she spoke, her stature seem'd to grow;?Still she denounced unmitigable woe:?Pain, want, and madness, pestilence, and death,?Rode forth triumphant at her blasting breath:?Their march she marshall'd, taught their ire to fall--?And seem'd herself the emblem of them all!
LOVE.
Love!--what is love? a mere machine, a spring?For freaks fantastic, a convenient thing,?A point to which each scribbling wight most steer,?Or vainly hope for food or favour here;?A summer's sigh; a winter's wistful tale:?A sound at which th' untutor'd maid turns pale;?Her soft eyes languish, and her bosom heaves,?And Hope delights as Fancy's dream deceives.
Thus speaks the heart which cold disgust invades,?When time instructs, and Hope's enchantment fades;?Through life's wide stage, from sages down to kings,?The puppets move, as art directs the strings:?Imperious beauty bows to sordid gold,?Her smiles, whence heaven flows emanent, are sold;?And affectation swells th' entrancing tones,?Which nature subjugates, and truth disowns.
I love th' ingenuous maiden, practised not?To pierce the heart with ambush'd glances, shot?From eyelashes, whose shadowy length she knows?To a hair's point, their high arch when to close?Half o'er the swimming orb, and when to raise,?Disclosing all the artificial blaze?Of unfelt passion, which alone can move?Him whom the genuine eloquence of love?Affected never, won with wanton wiles,?With soulless sighs, and meretricious smiles;?By nature unimpress'd, uncharm'd by thee,?Sweet goddess of my heart, Simplicity!
ON A DELIGHTFUL DRAWING IN MY ALBUM,
By my friend, T. WOODWARD, ESQ., of a Group, consisting of a Donkey, a Boy, and a Dog.
Welcome, my pretty Neddy--welcome too?Thy merry Rider with his apron blue;?And thou, poor Dog, most patient thing of all,?Begging for morsels that may never fall!?Oh! 'tis a faithful group--and it might shame?Painters of bold pretence, and greater name--?To see how nature triumphs, and how rare?Such matchless proofs of Nature's triumphs are--?The smallest particle of sand may tell?With what rich ore Pactolus' tide may swell:?And Woodward! this ingenious, chaste design,?Proclaims what treasures lie within the mine--?Pupil of Cooper--Nature's favorite son--?Whom, but to name, and to admire, is one!
STANZAS.
Say, why is the stern eye averted with scorn?Of the stoic who passes along??And why frowns the maid, else as mild as the morn.?On the victim of falsehood and wrong?
For the wretch sunk in sorrow, repentance, and shame,?The tear of compassion is won:?And alone must she forfeit the wretch's sad claim,?Because she's deceived and undone?
Oh! recal the stern look, ere it reaches her heart,?To bid its wounds rankle anew;?Oh! smile, or embalm with a tear the sad smart,?And angels will smile upon you.
Time was, when she knew nor opprobrium nor pain,?And youth could its pleasures impart,?Till some serpent distill'd through her bosom the stain,?As he wound round the strings of her heart.
Poor girl! let thy tears through thy blandishments break,?Nor strive to retrace them within;?For mine would I mingle with those on thy cheek,?Nor think that such sorrow were sin.
When the low-trampled reed, and the pine in its pride,?Shall alike feel the hand of decay,?May thy God grant that mercy the world has denied,?And wipe all your sorrows away!
SHAKSPEARE.
Respectfully inscribed, with permission, to the Committee?(of which His Majesty is the Patron) for the proposed Monuments to SHAKSPEARE at Stratford and in London. Intended to be?spoken at one of the Theatres.
While o'er this pageant of sublunar things?Oblivion spreads her unrelenting wings,?And sweeps adown her dark unebbing tide?Man, and his mightiest monuments of pride--?Alone, aloft, immutable, sublime,?Star-like, ensphered above the track of time,?Great SHAKSPEARE beams with undiminish'd ray.?His bright creations sacred from decay,?Like Nature's self, whose living form he drew,?Though still the same, still beautiful and new.
He came, untaught in academic bowers,?A gift to Glory from the Sylvan powers:?But what keen Sage,