Miscellanies (1785) :: :: University of Virginia Library

LINES,

BY A LADY, ON SEEING SOME WHITE HAIRS ON HER LOVER'S HEAD.

Thou to whose pow'r reluctantly we bend,
Foe to life's fairy dreams relentless time,
Alike the dread of lover and of friend;
Why stamp thy seal on manhood's rosy prime,
Already twining 'midst my Thyrsis' hair,
The snowy wreaths of age, the monuments of care.

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Thro' all her forms tho' nature owns thy sway,
That boasted sway thou'lt here exert in vain
To the last beam of life's declining day;
Thyrsis shall view unmov'd thy potent reign,
Secure to please while goodness knows to charm,
Fancy and taste delight, and sense and truth inform.

Tyrant, when from that lip of crimson glow,
Swept by thy chilling wing the rose shall fly;
When thy rude scythe indents his polish'd brow,
And quench'd is all the lustre of his eye:
When ruthless age disperses ev'ry grace,
Each smile that beams from that enchanting face.

Then thro' her stores shall active mem'ry rove,
Teaching her various charms to bloom anew,
And still the raptur'd eye of hopeless love
Shall bend on Thyrsis its delighted view;
Still shall he triumph with resistless pow'r,
Still rule the conquer'd heart to life's remotest hour.