CANTO IV. I. NOTHING SO difficult as a beginning In poesy, unless perhaps the end; For oftentimes, when Pegasus seems winning The race, he sprains a wing, and down we tend, Like Lucifer when hurl'd from heaven for sinning; Our sin the same, and hard as his to mend, Being pride, which leads the mind to soar too far, Till our own weakness shows us what we are. II. But time, which brings all beings to their level, While youth's hot wishes in our red veins revel, We know not this-the blood flows on too fast; But as the torrent widens towards the ocean, We ponder deeply on each past emotion. III. As boy, I thought myself a clever fellow, And wish'd that others held the same opinion; They took it up when my days grew more mellow, And other minds acknowledged my dominion: Now my sere fancy" falls into the yellow Leaf," and imagination droops her pinion, And the sad truth which hovers o'er my desk Turns what was once romantic to burlesque. IV. weep, And if I laugh at any mortal thing, V. Some have accused me of a strange design I don't pretend that I quite understand VI. To the kind reader of our sober clime This way of writing will appear exotic: Pulci was sire of the half-serious rhyme, Who sung when chivalry was more Quixotic, And revell'd in the fancies of the time, True knights, chaste dames, huge giants, kings despotic; But all these, save the last, being obsolete, I chose a modern subject as more meet. VII. How I have treated it, I do not know Perhaps no better than they 've treated me Not what they saw, but what they wish'd to see: VIII. Young Juan and his lady-love were left To their own hearts' most sweet society; Even Time, the pitiless, in sorrow cleft With his rude scythe such gentle bosoms; he Sigh'd to behold them of their hours bereft, Though foe to love ; and yet they could not be Meant to grow old, but die in happy spring, Before one charm or hope had taken wing. IX. Their faces were not made for wrinkles, their X. They were alone once more; for them to be Cut from its forest root of years—the river XI. The heart-which may be broken. Happy they! Thrice fortunate! who, of that fragile mould, The precious porcelain of human clay, Break with the first fall: they can ne'er behold The long year link'd with heavy day on day, And all which must be borne, and never told; While life's strange principle will often lie Deepest in those who long the most to die. XII. "Whom the gods love die young," was said of yore, ' Awaits at least even those whom longest miss XIII. Haidee and Juan thought not of the dead; The heavens, and earth, and air, seem'd made for them They found no fault with Time, save that he fled; They saw not in themselves aught to condemn. Each was the other's mirror, and but read Joy sparkling in their dark eyes like a gem, And knew such brightness was but the reflection XIV. The gentle pressure and the thrilling touch, The least glance better understood than words, Which still said all, and ne'er could say too much; ; XV. All these were theirs, for they were children still, To pass their lives in fountains and on flowers, And never know the weight of human hours. XVI. Moons changing had roll'd on, and changeless found By the mere senses; and that which destroys XVII. Oh beautiful! and rare as beautiful! But theirs was love in which the mind delights To lose itself, when the old world grows dull, And we are sick of its hack sounds and sights, Intrigues, adventures of the common school, Its petty passions, marriages, and flights, Where Hymen's torch but brands one strumpet more, Whose husband only knows her not a wh―re. XVIII Hard words; harsh truth; a truth which many know. Enough. The faithful and the fairy pair, Who never found a single hour too slow, What was it made them thus exempt from care? Young innate feelings all have felt below, Which perish in the rest, but in them were Inherent; what we mortals call romantic, XIX. This is in others a factitious state, An opium dream of too much youth and reading; But was in them their nature or their fate: No novels e'er had set their young hearts bleeding, For Haidee's knowledge was by no means great, And Juan was a boy of saintly breeding; So that there was no reason for their loves More than for those of nightingales or doves. XX. They gazed upon the sunset; 't is an hour power And twilight saw them link'd in passion's ties; Charm'd with each other, all things charm'd, that brought The past still welcome as the present thought. XXI. I know not why, but in that hour to-night, Even as they gazed, a sudden tremor came, XXII. That large black prophet eye seem'd to dilate As if their last day of a happy date With his broad, bright, and dropping orb were gone. Juan gazed on her as to ask his fate— He felt a grief, but knowing cause for none, His glance inquired of hers for some excuse XXIII. She turned to him, and smiled, but in that sort XXIV. Juan would question further, but she press'd I have tried both; so those who would a part take May chuse between the head-ache and the heart-ache. |