AH! why, unfeeling Winter, why
Still flags thy torpid wing?
Fly, melancholy Season, fly-
And yield the year to Spring.
Spring, the young cherubim of love,
An exile in disgrace,
Flits o'er the scene, like Noah's dove,
Nor finds a resting place.
When on the mountain's azure peak,
Alights her fairy form,
Cold blow the winds, and dark and bleak,
Around her rolls the storm.
If to the valley she repair,
For shelter and defence,
Thy wrath pursues the mourner there,
And drives her, weeping, thence.
She seeks the brook-the faithless brook,
Of her unmindful grown,
Feels the chill magic of thy look,
And lingers into stone.
She woos her embryo-flowers, in vain,
To rear their infant heads;
-Deaf to her voice, her flowers remain
Enchanted in their beds.
In vain she bids the trees expand
Their green, luxuriant charms;
-Bare in the wilderness they stand,
And stretch their withering arms.
Her favourite birds, in feeble notes,
Lament thy long delay;
And strain their little stammering throats,
To charm thy rage away.
Ah! why, usurping Winter, why
Still flags thy frozen wing?
Fly, unrelenting tyrant, fly
And yield the year to Spring!
*The poems, with this signature, in the succeeding volumes,
ADDRESSED TO A YOUNG LADY, ON HER
INTRODUCTION INTO HIGH LIFE.
ON Pleasure's gladsome wing repair
Where varied joys unite to meet thee;
Where high-born Lords, with flattering air,
And tender accents press to greet thee.
Yet if, amidst the splendid scene,
One softer thought should intervene,
One sigh should from thy bosom flee,
Oh! may that sigh be breath'd for me.
Let Fancy's magic power awhile
Transport thy lover to thy view,
Whose constant round of irksome toil
Each morning's light must still renew:
His days with sad suspence o'er-cast,
His nights in restless slumbers past:
Canst thou, my love, this portrait see,
Nor sigh for him, who droops for thee?
Oh! deign those tortures to appease,
That prey upon my aching breast:
Each doubt, each fear shall learn to cease,
If with thy love I still am blest;
Chearful I'll meet the varied pains,
That hard Necessity ordains,
And not a sigh my breast shall flee,
Unless that sigh be breath'd for thee.
My aspect, late so pale and wan,
That wore no dress but that of sorrow,
Shall bid its cloud of grief be gone,
And from thy smiles new pleasure borrow:
And when my love thou deign'st to meet,
With transport high my heart shall beat,
And should it sigh, its sighs shall be
Of pleasure born and love of thee.
MINDFUL of many a tear, and many a sigh,
My prudent heart from Anna bids me fly,
In vain! too weak my resolution proves:
This prudent heart, that gravely bids me, loves.
Descende cœlo, et dic age tibia
Regina longum Calliope melos;
Seu voce nunc mavis acuta,
Seu fidibus, citharâ ve Phœbi.
WHO shall awake with magic song
The wildly-throbbing soul?
Who dart the Muses light along,
And bid her thunders roll?
Or who with strain of gentlest note
In low and liquid warblings float,
Soft stealing thro' the silent air,
While Pity breathes her mildest lay,
And from her eye's Aprilian ray,
Slow drops a quivering tear?
Sublimity's enraptur❜d child,
Say, whither art thou fled?
Gone to awake with music wild
The slumbers of the dead?
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