POEMS.
59
Hope, the fond sun-flower, turned no more its eye,
Where orient lustre fired the eastern sky:
The Primrose, Youth, was dead, untimely dead;
The Lily, Virtue, lived, but drooped its head:
And Bliss [that Empress-Rose, whose odorous power
And blushing cups at Morn's delicious hour
Poured on my senses from its emerald seats
A blaze of beauties and a cloud of sweets].
Now, lost its glowing gems and green attire,
Met my sad eyes a rude unsightly briar,
Menaced my hand with thorns, as near I drew,
And wept its ravished flowers in tears of dew.
Where orient lustre fired the eastern sky:
The Primrose, Youth, was dead, untimely dead;
The Lily, Virtue, lived, but drooped its head:
And Bliss [that Empress-Rose, whose odorous power
And blushing cups at Morn's delicious hour
Poured on my senses from its emerald seats
A blaze of beauties and a cloud of sweets].
Now, lost its glowing gems and green attire,
Met my sad eyes a rude unsightly briar,
Menaced my hand with thorns, as near I drew,
And wept its ravished flowers in tears of dew.
Oh! I was sad at soul!—No aid was nigh,
No present joy, no future hope!—Mine eye
Where-e'er in suppliant anxious search I turned,
'Twas anguish, 'twas despair!—My bosom burned,
My heart was broken! Now in sullen mood
And dull dark apathy I silent stood,
Like one to marble changed: and now again
Wild Memory flashed her torch athwart my brain,
And fired it into madness. Then the ground
I struck with throbbing front, and scattered round
No present joy, no future hope!—Mine eye
Where-e'er in suppliant anxious search I turned,
'Twas anguish, 'twas despair!—My bosom burned,
My heart was broken! Now in sullen mood
And dull dark apathy I silent stood,
Like one to marble changed: and now again
Wild Memory flashed her torch athwart my brain,
And fired it into madness. Then the ground
I struck with throbbing front, and scattered round
