"Ah me! how sad," Myrtilla cried,
"To waste alone my years!"
While o'er a streamlet's flow'ry side
She pensive hung, and watch'd the tide
That dimpled with her tears.
"The world, though oft to merit blind,
Alas, I cannot blame;
For they have oft the knee inclined.
And pour'd the sigh--but, like the wind
Of winter, cold it came.
"Ah no! neglect I cannot rue."
Then o'er the limpid stream
She cast her eyes of ether blue;
Her wat'ry eyes look'd up to view
Their lovelier parent's beam.
And ever as the sad lament
Would thus her lips divide,
Her lips, like sister roses bent
By passing gales, elastick sent
Their blushes from the tide.
While mournful o'er her pictur'd face
Did then her glances steal,
She seem'd she thought a marble Grace,
T' enslave with love the human race,
But ne'er that love to feel.
"Ah, what avail those eyes replete
With charms without a name!
Alas, no kindred rays they meet,
To kindle by collision sweet
Of mutual love the flame!
"Oh, 'tis the worst of cruel things,
This solitary state!
Yon bird that trims his purple wings,
As on the bending bow he swings.
Prepares to join his mate.
"The little glow-worm sheds her light,
Nor sheds her light in vain--
That still her tiny lover's sight
Amid the darkness of the night
May trace her o'er the plain.
"All living nature seems to move
By sympathy divine--
The sea, the earth, the air above;
As if one universal love
Did all their hearts entwine!
"My heart alone of all my kind
No love can ever warm:
That only can resemblance find
With waste Arabia, where the wind
Ne'er breathes on human form;
"A blank, embodied space, that knows
No changes in its reign,
Save when the fierce tornado throws
Its barren sands, like drifted snows,
In ridges o'er the plain."
Thus plain'd the maid; and now her eyes
Slow-lifting from the tide,
Their liquid orbs with sweet surprise
A youth beheld in extacies,
Mute standing by her side.
"Forbear, oh, lovely maid, forbear,"
The youth enamour'd cried,
"Nor with Arabia's waste compare
The heart of one so young and fair,
To every charm allied.
"Or, if Arabia--rather say,
Where some delicious spring
Remurmurs to the leaves that play
Mid palm and date and flow'ret gay,
On zephyr's frolick wing.
"And now, methinks, I cannot deem
The picture else but true;
For I a wand'ring trav'ller seem
O'er life's drear waste, without a gleam
Of hope--if not in _you_."
Thus spake the youth; and then his tongue
Such converse sweet distill'd,
It seem'd, as on his words she hung,
As though a heavenly spirit sung,
And all her soul he fill'd.
He told her of his cruel fate,
Condemn'd along to rove,
From infancy to man's estate,
Though courted by the fair and great,
Yet never once to love.
And then from many a poet's page
The blest reverse he proved:
How sweet to pass life's pilgrimage,
From purple youth to sere old age,
Aye loving and beloved!
Here ceased the youth; but still his words
Did o'er her fancy play;
They seem'd the matin song of birds,
Or like the distant low of herds
That welcomes in the day.
The sympathetick chord she feels
Soft thrilling in her soul;
And, as the sweet vibration steals
Through every vein, in tender peals
She seems to hear it roll.
Her alter'd heart, of late so drear,
Then seem'd a faery land,
Where nymphs and rosy loves appear
On margin green of fountain clear,
And frolick hand in hand.
But who shall paint her crimson blush,
Nor think his hand of stone,
As now the secret with a flush
Did o'er her aching senses rush--
_Her heart was not her own!_
The happy Lindor, with a look
That every hope confessed,
Her glowing hand exulting took,
And press'd it, as she fearful shook,
In silence to his breast.
Myrtilla felt the spreading flame,
Yet knew not how to chide;
So sweet it mantled o'er her frame,
That, with a smile of pride and shame,
She own'd herself his bride.
No longer then, ye fair, complain,
And call the fates unkind;
The high, the low, the meek, the vain,
Shall each a sympathetick swain,
Another _self_ shall find.
To a Lady Who Spoke Slightingly of Poets.
Oh, censure not the Poet's art,
Nor think it chills the feeling heart
To love the gentle Muses.
Can that which in a stone or flower,
As if by transmigrating power,
His gen'rous soul infuses;
Can that for social joys impair
The heart that like the lib'ral air
All Nature's self embraces;
That in the cold Norwegian main,
Or mid the tropic hurricane
Her varied beauty traces;
That in her meanest work can find
A fitness and a grace combin'd
In blest harmonious union,
That even with the cricket holds,
As if by sympathy of souls,
Mysterious communion;
Can that with sordid selfishness
His wide-expanded heart impress,
Whose consciousness is loving;
Who, giving life to all he spies,
His joyous being multiplies,
In youthfulness improving?
Oh, Lady, then, fair queen of Earth,
Thou loveliest of mortal birth,
Spurn not thy truest lover;
Nor censure _him_ whose keener sense
Can feel thy magic influence
Where nought the world discover;
Whose eye on that bewitching face
Can every source unnumber'd trace
Of germinating blisses;
See Sylphids o'er thy forehead weave
The lily-fibred film, and leave
It fix'd with honied kisses;
While some within thy liquid eyes,
Like minnows of a thousand dies
Through lucid waters glancing,
In busy motion to and fro,
The gems of diamond-beetles sow,
Their lustre thus enhancing;
Here some, their little vases fill'd
With blushes for thy cheek distill'd
From roses newly blowing,
Each tiny thirsting pore supply;
And some in quick succession by
The down of peaches strewing;
There others who from hanging bell
Of cowslip caught the dew that fell
While yet the day was breaking,
And o'er thy pouting lips diffuse
The tincture--still its glowing hues
Of purple morn partaking:
Here some, that in the petals prest
Of humid honeysuckles, rest
From nightly fog defended,
Flutter their fragrant wings between,
Like humming-birds that scarce are seen,
They seem with air so blended!
While some, in equal clusters knit.
On either side in circles flit,
Like bees in April swarming,
Their tiny weight each other lend,
And force the yielding cheek to bend,
Thy laughing dimples forming.
Nor, Lady, think the Poet's eye
Can only outward charms espy,
Thy form alone adoring--
Ah, Lady, no: though fair they be.
Yet he a fairer sight may see,
Thy lovely _soul_ exploring:
And while from part to part it flies
The gentle Spirit he descries,
Through every line pursuing;
And feels upon his nature shower
That pure, that humanizing power,
Which raises by subduing.