The Poetical Works of James Gates Percival :: :: University of Virginia Library

Thou, who in the early spring
Hoverest on filmy wing,
Visiting the bright-eyed flowers,
Fluttering in loaded bowers,
Settling on the reddening rose,
Reddening ere it fully blows,
When its crisp and folded leaves
Just unroll their dewy tips,
Soft as infant beauty's lips,
Or anything that love believes,—
Little wanderer after pleasure,
Where is that enchanted treasure,
All that live are seeking for?
Is it in the blossom, or
Where we seek it, in the roses
Of a maiden's cheek, or rather

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In the many lights that gather
When her smiling lip uncloses?
Wouldst thou rather kiss a flower,
When 't is drooping with a shower,
Or with trembling, quivering wing
Rest thee on a dearer thing,
On a lip that has no stain,
On a brow that feels no pain,
In the beamings of an eye,
Where a world of visions lie,
Such as to the blest are given,
All of heaven,—all of heaven?
If thou lovest the blossom, I
Love the cheek, the lip and eye.