Of adamantine rocks incessant borne;
Or marks the wan ghost quit his wormy bed,
Or wanders sad, where o'er the moon-light vale,
Gigantic Terror stalks, with visage ghastly pale.
Fierce like thyself, but of a pallid hue,
Sits AGUE opposite with chattering teeth,
Who, while he fetches hard his labouring breath,
Wipes, from his temples cold, the clammy dew;
Hung o'er the glowing embers, all in vain
He chafes his shivering limbs, benumb'd with cold;
Life's crimson fountain through his veins creeps slow,
And languid beats each pulse and low,
While up his legs in many a tortuous chain,
The dull Torpedo flings his icy fold,
And Languor sits upon his leaden eye,
And heaves his panting breast the involuntary sigh.
Spare, RUTHLESS POWERS, ah, spare that virgin
That delicate soft cheek of vermeil die,
That ruby lip, and liquid-beaming eye,
Nor to the dank grave's cold obstruction doom
Virtue's meek lustre, whose unfolding charms
Heighten the graces of ingenuous youth;
Nor bid the Lover, robbed by Fate severe
Of her Affection holds most dear,
Hang, like the blasted oak, and stretch his arms
O'er the lost bud of faithfulness and truth!
But mostly spare the highly-cultur'd mind,
That thrills to every nerve with feelings too refin'd.
Then Memory shall the past endear;
Hope fondly hail the future year,
And as the Seasons' silent pace
Steals from that cheek one fading grace,
VIRTUE shall give the charm sublime,
That lives beyond the Death of Time:
Nor Time, nor Winter's blast shall move
The heart secure in MARY'S LOVE!
JANUARY 1, 1804.
THE blushes that glow on my cheek,
The sorrows that swell in my eye,
Say, whence are their source, and why thus do I heave
The frequent, the half-represt sigh?
Why thus from society fled,
Does reflection such pleasures impart,
And why do I welcome the pang that it brings,
As the dearest delight of my heart?
O! 'tis there that an image appears,
Which can silence or solitude cheer,
Which sooths the keen anguish, which prompts the
And turns into rapture the tear.
YE, whom stern Fate has doom'd to prove
The hard vicissitudes of Love,
Does Memory retain ;
Or has opposing Reason found
In all the passions' hostile round,
A rebel like DISDAIN?
Sure, not the pain which Beauty gives,
When hopeless Truth the wound receives,
And Fancy aids the spell,
Can make the slighted heart so pine-
Whose pangs, O Tityus! rival thine,
Though thine were fram'd in hell.
For who can bear th' averted look,
Or who with gentleness can brook
The haughty-gleaming eye?-
If Love with blear illusion sees,
Why is he not stark blind to these--
O Nature! tell me why?
Or if the kindly-proffer'd hand
Is with indignant warmth disdain'd,
Or touch'd with torpid pride-
Duller than Lethe's stream his blood,
Colder than Cydnus' icy flood,
That feels no feverish tide.
Too fierce, alas, I feel the flame,
Too quick it rushes through my frame,
Impell'd by Cælia's scorn;-
And though I drag a galling chain,
Yet, to relieve me from the pain,
I cannot, cannot fawn!
THOSE days of delusion were days of delight,
How blest was each morn, and how tranquil each night,
For Friendship a garland I hung on each tree,
And Love in return dropp'd his myrtle for me.
If time shew'd the flatt'ring falsehood too plain,
If faithless the Friend, and if perjur'd the Swain,
I have mouru'd; but shall Sorrow for ever engage,
And benumb with its frost till the winter of Age.
The cold breast of Caution let Apathy steel,
And Feeling refine till it ceases to feel,
With a warmth more exalted my bosom shall burn,
And Friendship and Love shall yet meet their return.
CLAMOURS OF MODERN REVOLUTIONISTS.
THEY who for Freedom idly rave,
And set no bounds to what they crave,
But still for Freedom brawl;
Ne'er think that Liberty's excess
Borders on wild Licentiousness,
And would but more enthral.
Distracted Gallia's lengthen'd sighs
Have shown what real ills may rise
From speculative good;
And prove-by reason unconfin'd,
Each anarch passion of the mind
Begets a monstrous brood.
So, from the pregnant womb of Nile,
The Ethiop hopes his arid soil
With liquid wealth may flow;
But if too far it leaves his shores,
The unresisted deluge pours
Fecundity of woe.
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