I said, as far from men, "How came I here, and when?" I had forgotten; and alas! Fancied myself in heaven, not where I was; And from that time till this, I bear Such love for the green bower, I cannot rest elsewhere. LEIGH HUNT. HE ENVIES EVERY SPOT THAT SHE FREQUENTS. O bright and happy flowers and herbage blessed, O thou, fair country, and thou, crystal stream, WROTTESLEY. TO THE SUN, WHOSE SETTING HID LAURA'S DWELLING FROM HIS VIEW. O blesséd Sun! that sole sweet leaf I love, The shadows from yon gentle heights that fall, The beauteous landscape and the blesséd scene, MACGREGOR. TO LOVE, ON LAURA WALKING ABROAD. Here stand we, Love, our glory to behold, But light up all their fires, to celebrate Her praise, whose presence charms their awful beauty. MERIVALE. HE LEAVES VAUCLUSE, BUT HIS SPIRIT REMAINS THERE WITH LAURA. The loved hills where I left myself behind, That still the fair yoke holds me, which despair And as a stag, sore struck by hunter's dart, Flies, and more grieves the more the chase is pressed, Endure at once my death and my delight, Racked with long grief, and weary with vain flight. MACGREGOR. HEARING NO TIDINGS OF HER, HE BEGINS TO DESPAIR. Still do I wait to hear, in vain still wait, Of that sweet enemy I love so well: If so, she will illuminate that sphere MOREHEAD. TO LAURA IN DEATH. HE DESIRES TO DIE, THAT HIS SOUL MAY BE WITH HER, AS HIS THOUGHTS ALREADY ARE. E'en in youth's fairest flower, when Love's dear sway Is wont with strongest power our hearts to bind, Leaving on earth her fleshly veil behind, From heaven she rules supreme my willing mind: That first of peace, of sin that latest day? As my fond thoughts her heavenward path pursue, MACGREGOR. HE PRAYS THAT SHE WILL BE NEAR HIM AT HIS DEATH, WHICH HE FEELS APPROACHING. Go, plaintive verse, to the cold marble go, Of life how I am wearied make her know, Of stemming these dread waves that round me rise: But, copying all her virtues I so prize, Her track I follow, yet my steps are slow. I sing of her, living or dead, alone, (Dead, did I say? She is immortal made!) That by the world she should be loved, and known. O in my passage hence may she be near, To greet my coming that's not long delayed; And may I hold in heaven the rank herself holds there! NOTT. HE WOULD DIE OF GRIEF, WERE SHE NOT SOMETIMES TO CONSOLE HIM WITH HER PRESENCE. To that soft look which now adorns the skies, The graceful bending of the radiant head, The face, the sweet angelic accents fled, That soothed me once, but now awake my sighs: I wonder that I am not long since dead! How tenderly she seems to hear the tale MOREHEAD. SINCE HER DEATH HE HAS CEASED TO LIVE. Death cannot make that beauteous face less fair, But that sweet face may lend to death a grace; My spirit's guide, from her each good I trace; Who learns to die, may seek his lesson there. That Holy One, who not his blood would spare, But did the dark Tartarean bolts unbrace; He, too, doth from my soul death's terrors chase: Then welcome, death, thy impress I would wear. And linger not, 'tis time that I had fled; Alas! my stay hath little here availed, Since she, my Laura blest, resigned her breath: Life's spring in me hath since that hour lain dead, In I her lived, my life in hers exhaled, The hour she died I felt within me death! WOLLASTON. |