1 XIV. ON FAME. "You cannot eat your cake and have it too." - Proverb. How fever'd is the man, who cannot look Upon his mortal days with temperate blood, Or the ripe plum finger its misty bloom; Should darken her pure grot with muddy But the rose leaves herself upon the brier, grace, Spoil his salvation for a fierce miscreed? XV. WHY did I laugh to-night? No voice will tell; No God, no Demon of severe response, Deigns to reply from Heaven or from Hell: Then to my human heart I turn at once. Why did I laugh? I know this Being's lease, And the world's gaudy ensigns see in shreds; Verse, Fame, and Beauty are intense indeed, But Death intenser - Death is Life's high meed. 1819. XVI. ON A DREAM. As Hermes once took to his feathers light, So play'd, so charm'd, so conquer'd, so bereft Where in the gust, the whirlwind, and the flaw Of rain and hailstones, lovers need not tell Their sorrows:- pale were the sweet lips I saw, Pale were the lips I kiss'd, and fair the form XVII. IF by dull rhymes our English must be chain'd, Fetter'd, in spite of pained loveliness, Let us inspect the lyre, and weigh the stress Than Midas of his coinage, let us be Jealous of dead leaves in the bay-wreath crown: So, if we may not let the Muse be free, She will be bound with garlands of her own. XVIII. THE day is gone, and all its sweets are gone! Sweet voice, sweet lips, soft hand, and softer breast, Warm breath, light whisper, tender semitone, Bright eyes, accomplish'd shape, and langʼrous waist! Faded the flower and all its budded charms, Faded the sight of beauty from my eyes, Faded the shape of beauty from my arms, Faded the voice, warmth, whiteness, paradise! Vanish'd unseasonably at shut of eve, When the dusk holiday or holinight Of fragrant-curtain'd love begins to weave |