As o'er her loom the Lesbian Maid
In love-sick languor hung her head,
Unknowing where her fingers strayed,
She weeping turned away, and said,
"Oh, my sweet Mother--'tis in vain--
"I cannot weave, as once I wove--
"So wildered is my heart and brain
"With thinking of that youth I love!"
Again the web she tried to trace,
But tears fell o'er each tangled thread;
While looking in her mother's face,
Who watchful o'er her leaned, she said,
"Oh, my sweet Mother--'tis in vain--
"I cannot weave, as once I wove--
"So wildered is my heart and brain
"With thinking of that youth I love!"
* * * * *
A silence followed this sweet air,
As each in tender musing stood,
Thinking, with lips that moved in prayer,
Of Sappho and that fearful flood:
While some who ne'er till now had known
How much their hearts resembled hers,
Felt as they made her griefs their own,
That _they_ too were Love's worshippers.
At length a murmur, all but mute,
So faint it was, came from the lute
Of a young melancholy maid,
Whose fingers, all uncertain played
From chord to chord, as if in chase
Of some lost melody, some strain
Of other times, whose faded trace
She sought among those chords again.
Slowly the half-forgotten theme
(Tho' born in feelings ne'er forgot)
Came to her memory--as a beam
Falls broken o'er some shaded spot;--
And while her lute's sad symphony
Filled up each sighing pause between;
And Love himself might weep to see
What ruin comes where he hath been--
As withered still the grass is found
Where fays have danced their merry round--
Thus simply to the listening throng
She breathed her melancholy song:--