Landon in The Literary Gazette 1823/Gipsy’s Prophecy
Literary Gazette 11th October 1823, Page 650
ORIGINAL POETRY.
“A turban girds her brow, white as the sea-foam,
Whence, all untrammelled, her dark thin hair
Streams fitfully upon her storm-beat front;
Her eye at rest, pale fire in its black orb
Innocuous sleeps—but, roused, Jove's thunder-cloud
Enkindles not so fiercely."—Duke of Mantua.
"This was the Sybil."
THE GIPSY'S PROPHECY.
Ladye, throw back thy raven hair,
Lay thy white brow in the moonlight bare,
I will look on the stars, and look on thee,
And read the page of thy destiny.
Little thanks shall I have for my tale,—
Even in youth thy cheek will be pale;
By thy side is a red rose tree,—
One lone rose droops withered, so thou wilt be.
Round thy neck is a ruby chain,
One of the rubies is broken in twain;
Throw on the ground each shattered part,
Broken and lost, they will be like thy heart.
Mark yon star,—it shone at thy birth;
Look again,—it has fallen to earth,
Its glory has pass'd like a thought away,—
So, or yet sooner, wilt thou decay.
Over yon fountain's silver fall
Is a moonlight rainbow's coronal;
Its hues of light will melt in tears,—
Well may they image thy future years.
I may not read in thy hazel eyes,
For the long dark lash that over them lies;
So in my art I can but see
One shadow of night on thy destiny.
I can give thee but dark revealings
Of passionate hopes and wasted feelings,
Of love that past like the lava wave,
Of a broken heart and an early grave!