But ah! I am no knight whose foeman dies;No cuirass glistens on my bosom’s swell;
I am no happy shepherd of the dell
Whose lips have trembled with a maiden’s eyes;
Yet must I dote upon thee, — call thee sweet.
Sweeter by far than Hybla’s honied roses
When steep’d in dew rich to intoxication.
Ah! I will taste that dew, for me ’tis meet,
And when the moon her pallid face discloses,
I’ll gather some by spells, and incantation.
You Say You Love
I
You say you love; but with a voice
Chaster than a nun’s, who singeth
The soft vespers to herself
While the chime-bell ringeth -
O love me truly!
II
You say you love; but with a smile
Cold as sunrise in September,
As you were Saint Cupid’s nun,
And kept his weeks of Ember.
O love me truly!
III
You say you love - but then your lips
Coral tinted teach no blisses.
More than coral in the sea -
They never pout for kisses -
O love me truly!
IV
You say you love; but then your hand
No soft squeeze for squeeze returneth,
It is like a statue’s dead -
While mine to passion burneth -
O love me truly!
V
O breathe a word or two of fire!
Smile, as if those words should burn me,
Squeeze as lovers should - O kiss
And in thy heart inurn me!
O love me truly!
Fancy
Ever let the Fancy roam,
Pleasure never is at home:
At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth;
Then let winged Fancy wander
Through the thought still spread beyond her:
Open wide the mind’s cage-door,
She’ll dart forth, and cloudward soar.
O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
Summer’s joys are spoilt by use, And the enjoying of the Spring
Fades as does its blossoming;
Autumn’s red-lipp’d fruitage too,
Blushing through the mist and dew,
Cloys with tasting: What do then?
Sit thee by the ingle, when
The sear faggot blazes bright,
Spirit of a winter’s night;
When the soundless earth is muffled,
And the caked snow is shuffled From the ploughboy’s heavy shoon;
When the Night doth meet the Noon
In a dark conspiracy
To banish Even from her sky.
Sit thee there, and send abroad,
With a mind self-overaw’d,
Fancy, high-commission’d: — send her!
She has vassals to attend her:
She will bring, in spite of frost,
Beauties that the earth hath lost; She will bring thee, all together,
All delights of summer weather;
All the buds and bells of May,
From dewy sward or thorny spray
All the heaped Autumn’s wealth,
With a still, mysterious stealth:
She will mix these pleasures up
Like three fit wines in a cup,
And thou shalt quaff it: — thou shalt hear
Distant harvest-carols clear; Rustle of the reaped corn;
Sweet birds antheming the morn:
And, in the same moment — hark!
’Tis the early April lark,
Or the rooks, with busy caw,
Foraging for sticks and straw.
Thou shalt, at one glance, behold
The daisy and the marigold;
White-plum’d lilies, and the first
Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst; Shaded hyacinth, alway
Sapphire queen of the mid-May;
And every leaf, and every flower
Pearled with the selfsame shower.
Thou shalt see the fieldmouse peep
Meagre from its celled sleep;
And the snake all winter-thin
