University of Virginia Library

AN ODE,

OCCASIONED BY A YOUNG LADY'S LAUGHING AT ME FOR STAYING FROM AN ASSEMBLY.

Oh 'twas hard—nay, cease your smiling,
Prithee laugh not—sure 'twas hard:
Still severer, you reviling,
Joys like those to be debarr'd:
Belles in beauty's glitter shining,
Gay delights soft-swimming round;
Duty's mighty chain confining,—
These I saw, from these was bound!
Hark, with transports softly thrilling,
Music melts each gentle breast,
Sounds once pleasing, sadly chilling,
Tell insulting—thou'rt distrest!
Thus, in cage the goldfinch sighing,
Droops, in summer sun-shine hung;
Fluttering friends around him flying,
Gayly tune their amorous song;
There their burnish'd wings displaying,
Tuning here their notes to love:
He in vain like them essaying
Free to sing, and free to rove.
Cytherea fond attending,
Wou'd young Paris not have gone?
You, with beauty her's transcending
Sighing view'd I, forc'd to shun.
Ask the sailor, if appearing
Bliss and plenty on the coast,
From so sweet enchantments veering,
Rocks and winds, and waves he'd trust?
Sight most cutting! view those graces
Smiling in each dimpled cheek:
Joy on joy in transport presses,
General rapture all things speak.
I sink, I flag: sleep cruel flies me,
Darkness, horror round my bed:
Twelve's sad beats with fears surprize me,
Ghosts and goblins, maiden's dread!
“Sleep, benignant god, receive me;”
He consents—and all is peace:
And in kindness to relieve me,
Bore me where my soul found ease:
In a grove of myrtle straying,
Thee, my Delia, there I found:
Cupid too was come a-maying,
Him we join'd, and mirth went round.
Sudden wak'd from bliss so charming,
(Pleasures oft exchange for pain:)
Soon the scene my soul alarming,
Came that Cupid and his train;
And a Venus, Delia, believe me,—
Fair and form'd in stamp like thine:
Cupid's whispers can't deceive me—
Both are sisters, both divine.