 | Young Arthur |  |
VARIATION VI.
Love, War, and Music.
There is in female breasts a feeling,
When valour (youth and grace revealing)
Tells his deeds of fame and glory,
That, so bewitching is the story,
Gives fancy such a range to rove
There's danger from the toils of love. And why?
Their softness, like the zephyr breathing;
Or silken fly in rose leaves sheathing;
Or bending flowret, bearing never
E'en the sigh of gentlest gale;
Or plant susceptive, shrinking ever
E'er the hand its leaves assail:
This yielding softness seeks protection,
Safety guiding love's election:
And then the joy to hear the story
Of a graceful lover's glory;
The thousand, thrilling, sweet sensations
Which prompt the magic animations,
That flush the cheek, and give the eye
Beauty's most charming brilliancy.
To hear his prowess crown'd with praise
Which must in rivals envy raise;
She listens, rapt, love stronger growing
By each palpitation shown;
Loving on she listens, knowing
The hero's glory is her own.
These like magic 'twin'd together
Make resistless sword and feather.
Love is the flow'r
Of the poet's bow'r,
And love is the life of the poets' lay;
But, love to sing
When he wakes the string,
The burden's too often “ah! well-a-day!”
When valour (youth and grace revealing)
Tells his deeds of fame and glory,
That, so bewitching is the story,
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There's danger from the toils of love. And why?
Their softness, like the zephyr breathing;
Or silken fly in rose leaves sheathing;
Or bending flowret, bearing never
E'en the sigh of gentlest gale;
Or plant susceptive, shrinking ever
E'er the hand its leaves assail:
This yielding softness seeks protection,
Safety guiding love's election:
And then the joy to hear the story
Of a graceful lover's glory;
The thousand, thrilling, sweet sensations
Which prompt the magic animations,
That flush the cheek, and give the eye
Beauty's most charming brilliancy.
To hear his prowess crown'd with praise
Which must in rivals envy raise;
She listens, rapt, love stronger growing
By each palpitation shown;
Loving on she listens, knowing
The hero's glory is her own.
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Make resistless sword and feather.
Love is the flow'r
Of the poet's bow'r,
And love is the life of the poets' lay;
But, love to sing
When he wakes the string,
The burden's too often “ah! well-a-day!”
THE LOST FOR LOVE.
Zephyr is toying with the rose,
Whispering love and wooing blisses;
Her fluttering leaves her joy disclose,
Coquetishly curling to zephyr's kisses;
Yet zephyr seems jealous the dew, more blest
Than he, on her redolent leaves should rest;
And he ruffles her leaves with his angry breath
The drop to chase and pursue to death;
But the dew in the drapery of her leaves
Conceals itself, a sweet death to prove!
Yet envious zephyr, defeated, grieves;
And the dew drop's lost, and is lost for love.
Whispering love and wooing blisses;
Her fluttering leaves her joy disclose,
Coquetishly curling to zephyr's kisses;
Yet zephyr seems jealous the dew, more blest
Than he, on her redolent leaves should rest;
And he ruffles her leaves with his angry breath
The drop to chase and pursue to death;
But the dew in the drapery of her leaves
Conceals itself, a sweet death to prove!
Yet envious zephyr, defeated, grieves;
And the dew drop's lost, and is lost for love.
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Zephyr is angry with the rose,
Whose head plays with scorn as he mourns lost blisses;
When a golden fly, whose wings disclose
Many a gem, now courts her kisses;
And, hovering round, to alight essays
On a gay green leaf, on her charms to gaze;
But zephyr so angrily fans his wings
That when from the leaf the gay fly springs,
To kiss the flow'r, 'tis his fate to find
A rival resolving his claim to prove,
Whose breath to him is a stormy wind,
And the gay fly's lost, and is lost for love.
Whose head plays with scorn as he mourns lost blisses;
When a golden fly, whose wings disclose
Many a gem, now courts her kisses;
And, hovering round, to alight essays
On a gay green leaf, on her charms to gaze;
But zephyr so angrily fans his wings
That when from the leaf the gay fly springs,
To kiss the flow'r, 'tis his fate to find
A rival resolving his claim to prove,
Whose breath to him is a stormy wind,
And the gay fly's lost, and is lost for love.
Zephyr exulting, round the rose
Wantonly playing, snatches blisses;
Her reddening leaves her rage disclose,
While ever anon he blows her kisses:
And the rose would the darting sun-beam woo,
Which fades her leaves, exhaling the dew;
And the rain to woo the rose appears,
Whose wooing the rose repents in tears;
And zephyr, by fanning, her tears would dry,
And her wet, matted leaves by his curling move;
But the rude wind drives and zephyr must die—
Lost with the rose, who is lost for love.
Wantonly playing, snatches blisses;
Her reddening leaves her rage disclose,
While ever anon he blows her kisses:
And the rose would the darting sun-beam woo,
Which fades her leaves, exhaling the dew;
And the rain to woo the rose appears,
Whose wooing the rose repents in tears;
And zephyr, by fanning, her tears would dry,
And her wet, matted leaves by his curling move;
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Lost with the rose, who is lost for love.
There is in female breasts a feeling,
Tho' valour be his deeds revealing,
With all of grace and youth combin'd,
Which guards from soft approach the mind;
'Tis when, anterior, the fond heart
Has love imbib'd devoid of art;
And then, if mutual truth it meet,
It loves till life's last pulses beat.
Tho' valour be his deeds revealing,
With all of grace and youth combin'd,
Which guards from soft approach the mind;
'Tis when, anterior, the fond heart
Has love imbib'd devoid of art;
And then, if mutual truth it meet,
It loves till life's last pulses beat.
Hence Edith she listen'd, but love took no part,
For with Allan had wander'd her virgin heart.
For with Allan had wander'd her virgin heart.
Let love be sung 'tis ne'er in vain,
Every ear complying;
Fancy listens to the strain
Till half her breathing's sighing.
Every ear complying;
Fancy listens to the strain
Till half her breathing's sighing.
For love is so woven in human heart
Its fibres entwine the core;
And love is of life an integral part,
Whose loss no balms restore.
Its fibres entwine the core;
And love is of life an integral part,
Whose loss no balms restore.
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Beat but the drum and the town's in alarm;
The trumpet sound, all, in fancy, arm:
Thus the tale of the battle, the siege, and the storming,
The mind ever seizing, the breast ever warming,
Irresistibly fixes and fires with its story;
And dead is the ear never open to glory.
The trumpet sound, all, in fancy, arm:
Thus the tale of the battle, the siege, and the storming,
The mind ever seizing, the breast ever warming,
Irresistibly fixes and fires with its story;
And dead is the ear never open to glory.
Thus poets of love and of glory sing
Rapt fancy to draw to the lay;
And if they touch not an according string,
And the soul of the mind to the purpose bring,
'Tis—alas! and a well-a-day!
And alas! and a well-a-day for me
May an apt burden, haply, be.
Rapt fancy to draw to the lay;
And if they touch not an according string,
And the soul of the mind to the purpose bring,
'Tis—alas! and a well-a-day!
And alas! and a well-a-day for me
May an apt burden, haply, be.
I hear the harp as my lay I write,
And the hour is the growing age of night;
When care is a king, his labour o'er,
And traffic has clos'd his restless door;
When all is watchful, and all is still,
And nature resigns her weary will
To the wandering thought, and the waking dream;
And rest contemplates the taper's beam;
And the senses are wasting with apathy,
The dim eye fix'd on vacuity;
And sleep comes stealing, and points the hour;
Health and peace, to his will resign'd,
Seek the couch, as the bee the flow'r;
For O! honey-sweet is the balm they find.
But grief and disease his pow'r defy,
No collyrium has he for the wasting eye.
And the muse awakes, for the hour she loves
When the nightingale warbles in lonely groves;
The muse awakes, and the minstrel's strain
Is the cooling balm to her fever'd brain.
I hear the harp, and the cares they flee
When I list to its soothing melody;
For oft my cot from that minstrel's art
Is made the home of a joyful heart.
O, minstrel maid, when thou wak'st the strings
'Tis to me as when peace a love-lay sings;
O! could I tell what those sounds reveal,
How I fancy, and how I feel—
While o'er the strings flying thy fingers strive,
Like rivals in sweetness, all-sensitive,
As if all were th' affections of harmony wooing,
With jealousy ev'ry sound pursuing,
Each seeming, when waking a note, to watch
Lest its rival the exquisite tone should catch;
Thro' the strings still appearing to peep at each other,
As if to catch tones from a blissful brother;
Each ever impatient accord to be keeping;
Languishing, gliding, or swelling, or sweeping;
With energy striking, or tremblingly trilling,
Seeming to swoon from their own sweet thrilling:
Yet such sweet emulation the soul's should be
For ever “resolving in harmony:”
And at the arpeggio's brilliant play
All seem to be running with joy away,
Like love and gay innocence toying with blisses,
Or the dimpled smiles wooing the dulcet kisses.
And the hour is the growing age of night;
When care is a king, his labour o'er,
And traffic has clos'd his restless door;
When all is watchful, and all is still,
And nature resigns her weary will
To the wandering thought, and the waking dream;
And rest contemplates the taper's beam;
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The dim eye fix'd on vacuity;
And sleep comes stealing, and points the hour;
Health and peace, to his will resign'd,
Seek the couch, as the bee the flow'r;
For O! honey-sweet is the balm they find.
But grief and disease his pow'r defy,
No collyrium has he for the wasting eye.
And the muse awakes, for the hour she loves
When the nightingale warbles in lonely groves;
The muse awakes, and the minstrel's strain
Is the cooling balm to her fever'd brain.
I hear the harp, and the cares they flee
When I list to its soothing melody;
For oft my cot from that minstrel's art
Is made the home of a joyful heart.
O, minstrel maid, when thou wak'st the strings
'Tis to me as when peace a love-lay sings;
O! could I tell what those sounds reveal,
How I fancy, and how I feel—
While o'er the strings flying thy fingers strive,
Like rivals in sweetness, all-sensitive,
As if all were th' affections of harmony wooing,
With jealousy ev'ry sound pursuing,
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Lest its rival the exquisite tone should catch;
Thro' the strings still appearing to peep at each other,
As if to catch tones from a blissful brother;
Each ever impatient accord to be keeping;
Languishing, gliding, or swelling, or sweeping;
With energy striking, or tremblingly trilling,
Seeming to swoon from their own sweet thrilling:
Yet such sweet emulation the soul's should be
For ever “resolving in harmony:”
And at the arpeggio's brilliant play
All seem to be running with joy away,
Like love and gay innocence toying with blisses,
Or the dimpled smiles wooing the dulcet kisses.
O, melody, thou art the heavenly beam
That comes from hope to the heart of woe;
And, O, thou art like the good man's dream,
When with him the minis'tring angels go.
Now, as if thy melody, minstrel maid,
Like the painter's light requir'd deep shade,
The church clock strikes, solemn and slow!
Deep bass to thy light, harmonious flow.
O, take it a lesson while in youth's prime;
As must thy measure be rul'd by time,
So time rules all; and, when hearts rejoice,
His guiding hand, or his friendly voice,
Is heard or seen, and they point to, or tell,
By the fading leaf, or the sounding bell,
Of where, sweet minstrel maid shall be,
For ever, for ever, all harmony!
That comes from hope to the heart of woe;
And, O, thou art like the good man's dream,
When with him the minis'tring angels go.
Now, as if thy melody, minstrel maid,
Like the painter's light requir'd deep shade,
The church clock strikes, solemn and slow!
Deep bass to thy light, harmonious flow.
O, take it a lesson while in youth's prime;
As must thy measure be rul'd by time,
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His guiding hand, or his friendly voice,
Is heard or seen, and they point to, or tell,
By the fading leaf, or the sounding bell,
Of where, sweet minstrel maid shall be,
For ever, for ever, all harmony!
Fair minstrel! how dear are thy strains to me!
Thy day summer's dawning, O, bright may it be;
May thy mind and thy strain vary never;
May the spirits of harmony dwell on thy lay,
Compose thee by night, and inspire thee by day,
And with Amaranth wreathe thee for ever!
Thy day summer's dawning, O, bright may it be;
May thy mind and thy strain vary never;
May the spirits of harmony dwell on thy lay,
Compose thee by night, and inspire thee by day,
And with Amaranth wreathe thee for ever!
| Young Arthur | |