TO
SYLVIA
ON HER APPROACHING NUPTIALS.
Hope comes to _Youth_, gliding thro' azure skies
With amaranth crown:--her full robe, snowy white,
Floats on the gale, and our exulting sight
Marks it afar.--From _waning_ Life she flies,
Wrapt in a mist, covering her starry eyes
With her fair hand.--But now, in floods of light,
She meets thee, SYLVIA, and with glances, bright
As lucid streams, when Spring's clear mornings rise.
From Hymen's kindling torch, a yellow ray
The shining texture of her spotless vest
Gilds;--and the Month that gives the early day
The scent odōrous[1], and the carol blest,
Pride of the rising Year, enamour'd MAY,
Paints its redundant folds with florets gay.
1: _Odōrous._ Milton, in the Par. Lost, gives the lengthened and
harmonious accent to that word, rather than the short, and _common_
one, ōdorous:
----“the bright consummate flower
Spirit odōrous breathes.”