O FRIENDS! who have accompanied thus far
My quickening steps, sometimes where sorrow sate
Dejected, and sometimes where valour stood
Resplendent, right before us; here perhaps
We best might part; but one to valour dear
Comes up in wrath and calls me worse than foe,
Reminding me of gifts too ill deserved.
I must not blow away the flowers he gave,
Altho' now faded; I must not efface
The letters his own hand has traced for me.
Here terminates my park of poetry.
Look out no longer for extensive woods,
For clusters of unlopt and lofty trees,
With stately animals coucht under them,
Or grottoes with deep wells of water pure,
And ancient figures in the solid rock :
Come, with our sunny pasture be content,
Our narrow garden and our homestead croft,
And tillage not neglected. Love breathes round;
Love, the bright atmosphere, the vital air,
Of youth; without it life and death are one.
She leads in solitude her youthful hours,
Her nights are restlessness, her days are pain. O when will Health and Pleasure come again, Adorn her brow and strew her path with flowers, And wandering wit relume the roseate bowers,
And turn and trifle with his festive train? Grant me, O grant this wish, ye heavenly Powers! All other hope, all other wish, restrain.
Come back, ye Smiles, that late forsook
Each breezy path and ferny nook.
Come Laughter, though the Sage hath said
Thou favourest most the thoughtless head:
I blame thee not, howe'er inclin'd
To love the vacant easy mind,
But now am ready, may it please,
That mine be vacant and at ease.
Sweet children of celestial breed,
Be ruled by me; repress your speed.
Laughter! though Momus gave thee birth,
And said, My darling, stay on earth!
Smiles! though from Venus you arise,
And live for ever in the skies,
Softly! and let not one descend
But first alights upon my friend.
When one upon her cheek appears,
A thousand spring to life from hers;
Death smites his disappointed urn,
And spirit, pleasure, wit, return.
WITH PETRARCA'S SONNETS.
Behold what homage to his idol paid
The tuneful suppliant of Valclusa's shade.
His verses still the tender heart engage,
They charm'd a rude, and please a polisht age:
Some are to nature and to passion true,
And all had been so, had he lived for you.
I draw with trembling hand my doubtful lot;
Yet where are Fortune's frowns if she frown not
From whom I hope, from whom I fear, the kiss?
O gentle Love! if there be aught beyond
That makes the bosom calm, but leaves it fond,
O let her give me that, and take back this!
Thou hast not rais'd, Ianthe, such desire
In any breast as thou hast rais'd in mine.
No wandering meteor now, no marshy fire,
Leads on my steps, but lofty, but divine:
And, if thou chillest me, as chill thou dost
When I approach too near, too boldly gaze,
So chills the blushing morn, so chills the host
Of vernal stars, with light more chaste than day's.
Darling shell, where hast thou been,
West or East? or heard or seen?
From what pastimes art thou come?
Can we make amends at home?
Whether thou hast tuned the dance
To the maids of ocean
Know I not; but Ignorance
Never hurts Devotion.
This I know, Ianthe's shell,
I must ever love thee well,
Tho' too little to resound
While the Nereids dance around;
For, of all the shells that are,
Thou art sure the brightest;
Thou, Ianthe's infant care,
Most these eyes delightest.
To thy early aid she owes
Teeth like budding snowdrop rows:
And what other shell can say
On her bosom once it lay?
That which into Cyprus bore
Venus from her native sea,
(Pride of shells!) was never more
Dear to her than thou to me.
Away my verse; and never fear,
As men before such beauty do;
On you she will not look severe,
She will not turn her eyes from you.
Some happier graces could I lend
That in her memory you should live,
Some little blemishes might blend,
For it would please her to forgive.
My hopes retire; my wishes as before Struggle to find their resting-place in vain : The ebbing sea thus beats against the shore; The shore repels it; it returns again.
Lie, my fond heart at rest,
She never can be ours.
Why strike upon my breast
The slowly passing hours?
Ah! breathe not out the name!
That fatal folly stay! Conceal the eternal flame,
And tortured ne'er betray.
The heart you cherish can not change;
The fancy, faint and fond,
Has never more the wish to range
Nor power to rise beyond.
Clifton! in vain thy varied scenes invite,
The mossy bank, dim glade, and dizzy hight;
The sheep that, starting from the tufted thyme,
Untune the distant church's mellow chime,
As o'er each limb a gentle horror creeps,
And shakes above our heads the craggy steeps.
Pleasant I've thought it to pursue the rower
While light and darkness seize the changeful oar,
The frolic Naiads drawing from below
A net of silver round the black canoe.
Now the last lonely solace must it be
To watch pale evening brood o'er land and sea,
Then join my friends and let those friends believe
My cheeks are moisten'd by the dews of eve.
Ask me not, a voice severe
Tells me, for it gives me pain. Peace! the hour, too sure, is near When I can not ask again.
O thou whose happy pencil strays
Where I am call'd, nor dare to gaze,
But lower my eye and check my tongue;
O, if thou valuest peaceful days,
Pursue the ringlet's sunny maze,
And dwell not on those lips too long.
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