University of Virginia Library

ELEGIAC SONNETS.

SONNET LX. TO AN AMIABLE GIRL.

Miranda! mark where shrinking from the gale,
Its silken leaves yet moist with early dew,
That fair faint flower, the Lily of the Vale,
Droops its meek head, and looks, methinks, like you!
Wrapp'd in a shadowy veil of tender green,
Its snowy bells a soft perfume dispense,
And bending as reluctant to be seen,
In simple loveliness it sooths the sense.
With bosom bared to meet the garish day,
The glaring Tulip, gaudy, undismay'd,
Offends the eye of taste; that turns away
To seek the Lily in her fragrant shade.
With such unconscious beauty, pensive, mild,
Miranda charms—Nature's soft modest child.

SONNET LXI. SUPPOSED TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN IN AMERICA.

Ill-omen'd bird! whose cries portentous float
O'er yon savannah with the mournful wind;
While, as the Indian hears your piercing note,
Dark dread of future evil fills his mind;
Wherefore with early lamentation break
The dear delusive visions of repose?
Why from so short felicity awake
My wounded senses to substantial woes?
O'er my sick soul thus rous'd from transient rest,
Pale Superstition sheds her influence drear,
And to my shuddering fancy would suggest
Thou com'st to speak of every woe I fear.
Ah! Reason little o'er the soul prevails,
When, from ideal ill, the enfeebled spirit fails!

SONNET LXII. WRITTEN ON PASSING BY MOON-LIGHT THROUGH A VILLAGE, WHILE THE GROUND WAS COVERED WITH SNOW.

While thus I wander, cheerless and unblest,
And find in change of place but change of pain;
In tranquil sleep the village labourers rest,
And taste that quiet I pursue in vain!
Hush'd is the hamlet now, and faintly gleam
The dying embers, from the casement low
Of the thatch'd cottage; while the Moon's wan beam
Lends a new lustre to the dazzling snow.
O'er the cold waste, amid the freezing night,
Scarce heeding whither, desolate I stray;
For me, pale Eye of Evening, thy soft light
Leads to no happy home; my weary way
Ends but in sad vicissitudes of care:
I only fly from doubt—to meet despair!

SONNET LXIII. THE GOSSAMER.

O'er faded heath-flowers spun, or thorny furze,
The filmy Gossamer is lightly spread;
Waving in every sighing air that stirs,
As Fairy fingers had entwined the thread:
A thousand trembling orbs of lucid dew
Spangle the texture of the fairy loom,
As if soft Sylphs, lamenting as they flew,
Had wept departed Summer's transient bloom:
But the wind rises, and the turf receives
The glittering web:—So, evanescent, fade
Bright views that Youth with sanguine heart believes:
So vanish schemes of bliss, by Fancy made;
Which, fragile as the fleeting dews of morn,
Leave but the wither'd heath, and barren thorn!

SONNET LXIV. WRITTEN AT BRISTOL IN THE SUMMER OF 1794.

Here from the restless bed of lingering pain
The languid sufferer seeks the tepid wave,
And feels returning health and hope again
Disperse “the gathering shadows of the grave!”
And here romantic rocks that boldly swell,
Fringed with green woods, or stain'd with veins of ore,
Call'd native Genius forth, whose Heav'n-taught skill
Charm'd the deep echos of the rifted shore.
But tepid waves, wild scenes, or summer air,
Restore they palsied Fancy, woe-deprest?
Check they the torpid influence of Despair,
Or bid warm Health re-animate the breast;
Where Hope's soft visions have no longer part,
And whose sad inmate is—a broken heart?

SONNET LXV. TO DR. PARRY OF BATH, WITH SOME BOTANIC DRAWINGS WHICH HAD BEEN MADE SOME YEARS.

In happier hours, ere yet so keenly blew
Adversity's cold blight, and bitter storms,
Luxuriant Summer's evanescent forms,
And Spring's soft blooms with pencil light I drew:
But as the lovely family of flowers
Shrink from the bleakness of the Northern blast,
So fail from present care and sorrow past
The slight botanic pencil's mimic powers—
Nor will kind Fancy even by Memory's aid,
Her visionary garlands now entwine;
Yet while the wreaths of Hope and Pleasure fade,
Still is one flower of deathless blossom mine,
That dares the lapse of Time, and Tempest rude,
The unfading Amaranth of Gratitude.

SONNET LXVI. WRITTEN IN A TEMPESTUOUS NIGHT, ON THE COAST OF SUSSEX.

The night-flood rakes upon the stony shore;
Along the rugged cliffs and chalky caves
Mourns the hoarse Ocean, seeming to deplore
All that are buried in his restless waves—
Mined by corrosive tides, the hollow rock
Falls prone, and rushing from its turfy height,
Shakes the broad beach with long-resounding shock,
Loud thundering on the ear of sullen Night;
Above the desolate and stormy deep,
Gleams the wan Moon, by floating mist opprest;
Yet here while youth, and health, and labour sleep,
Alone I wander—Calm untroubled rest,
“Nature's soft nurse,” deserts the sigh-swoln breast,
And shuns the eyes, that only wake to weep!

SONNET LXVII. ON PASSING OVER A DREARY TRACT OF COUNTRY, AND NEAR THE RUINS OF A DESERTED CHAPEL, DURING A TEMPEST.

Swift fleet the billowy clouds along the sky,
Earth seems to shudder at the storm aghast;
While only beings as forlorn as I,
Court the chill horrors of the howling blast.
Even round yon crumbling walls, in search of food,
The ravenous Owl foregoes his evening flight,
And in his cave, within the deepest wood,
The Fox eludes the tempest of the night.
But to my heart congenial is the gloom
Which hides me from a World I wish to shun;
That scene where Ruin saps the mouldering tomb,
Suits with the sadness of a wretch undone.
Nor is the deepest shade, the keenest air,
Black as my fate, or cold as my despair.

SONNET LXVIII. WRITTEN AT EXMOUTH, MIDSUMMER, 1795.

Fall, dews of Heaven, upon my burning breast,
Bathe with cool drops these ever-streaming eyes;
Ye gentle Winds, that fan the balmy West,
With the soft rippling tide of morning rise,
And calm my bursting heart, as here I keep
The vigil of the wretched!—Now away
Fade the pale stars, as wavering o'er the deep
Soft rosy tints announce another day,
The day of Middle Summer!—Ah! in vain
To those who mourn like me, does radiant June
Lead on her fragrant hours; for hopeless pain
Darkens with sullen clouds the Sun of Noon,
And veil'd in shadows Nature's face appears
To hearts o'erwhelm'd with grief, to eyes suffused with tears.

SONNET LXIX. WRITTEN AT THE SAME PLACE, ON SEEING A SEAMAN RETURN WHO HAD BEEN IMPRISONED AT ROCHFORT.

Clouds, gold and purple, o'er the westering ray
Threw a bright veil, and catching lights between,
Fell on the glancing sail, that we had seen
With soft, but adverse winds, throughout the day
Contending vainly: as the vessel nears,
Encreasing numbers hail it from the shore;
Lo! on the deck a pallid form appears,
Half wondering to behold himself once more
Approach his home—And now he can discern
His cottage thatch amid surrounding trees;
Yet, trembling, dreads lest sorrow or disease
Await him there, embittering his return:
But all he loves are safe; with heart elate,
Tho' poor and plunder'd, he absolves his fate!

SONNET LXX. ON BEING CAUTIONED AGAINST WALKING ON AN HEADLAND OVERLOOKING THE SEA, BECAUSE IT WAS FREQUENTED BY A LUNATIC.

Is there a solitary wretch who hies
To the tall cliff, with starting pace or slow,
And, measuring, views with wild and hollow eyes
Its distance from the waves that chide below;
Who, as the sea-born gale with frequent sighs
Chills his cold bed upon the mountain turf,
With hoarse, half-utter'd lamentation, lies
Murmuring responses to the dashing surf?
In moody sadness, on the giddy brink,
I see him more with envy than with fear;
He has no nice felicities that shrink
From giant horrors; wildly wandering here,
He seems (uncursed with reason) not to know
The depth or the duration of his woe.

SONNET LXXI. WRITTEN AT WEYMOUTH IN WINTER.

The chill waves whiten in the sharp North-east;
Cold, cold the night-blast comes, with sullen sound;
And black and gloomy, like my cheerless breast,
Frowns the dark pier and lonely sea-view round.
Yet a few months—and on the peopled strand
Pleasure shall all her varied forms display;
Nymphs lightly tread the bright reflecting sand,
And proud sails whiten all the summer bay:
Then, for these winds that whistle keen and bleak,
Music's delightful melodies shall float
O'er the blue waters; but 'tis mine to seek
Rather, some unfrequented shade, remote
From sights and sounds of gaiety—I mourn
All that gave me delight—Ah! never to return!

SONNET LXXII. TO THE MORNING STAR.

WRITTEN NEAR THE SEA.

SONNET LXXIII. TO A QUERULOUS ACQUAINTANCE.

Thou! whom Prosperity has always led
O'er level paths, with moss and flow'rets strewn;
For whom she still prepares a downy bed
With roses scatter'd, and to thorns unknown,
Wilt thou yet murmur at a mis-placed leaf?
Think, ere thy irritable nerves repine,
How many, born with feelings keen as thine,
Taste all the sad vicissitudes of grief;
How many steep in tears their scanty bread;
Or, lost to reason, Sorrow's victims! rave:
How many know not where to lay their head;
While some are driven by anguish to the grave!
Think; nor impatient at a feather's weight,
Mar the uncommon blessings of thy fate!

SONNET LXXIV. THE WINTER NIGHT.

“Sleep, that knits up the ravell'd sleeve of care,”
Forsakes me, while the chill and sullen blast,
As my sad soul recalls its sorrows past,
Seems like a summons, bidding me prepare
For the last sleep of death—Murmuring I hear
The hollow wind around the ancient towers,
While night and silence reign; and cold and drear
The darkest gloom of Middle Winter lours;
But wherefore fear existence such as mine,
To change for long and undisturb'd repose?
Ah! when this suffering being I resign,
And o'er my miseries the tomb shall close,
By her, whose loss in anguish I deplore,
I shall be laid, and feel that loss no more!

SONNET LXXV.

[Where the wild woods and pathless forests frown]

Where the wild woods and pathless forests frown,
The darkling Pilgrim seeks his unknown way,
Till on the grass he throws him weary down,
To wait in broken sleep the dawn of day:
Thro' boughs just waving in the silent air,
With pale capricious light the Summer Moon
Chequers his humid couch; while Fancy there,
That loves to wanton in the Night's deep noon,
Calls from the mossy roots and fountain edge
Fair visionary Nymphs that haunt the shade,
Or Naiads rising from the whispering sedge;
And, 'mid the beauteous group, his dear loved maid
Seems beckoning him with smiles to join the train:
Then, starting from his dream, he feels his woes again!

SONNET LXXVI. TO A YOUNG MAN ENTERING THE WORLD.

Go now, ingenuous Youth!—The trying hour
Is come: The World demands that thou shouldst go
To active life: There titles, wealth and power
May all be purchas'd—Yet I joy to know
Thou wilt not pay their price. The base controul
Of petty despots in their pedant reign
Already hast thou felt;—and high disdain
Of Tyrants is imprinted on thy soul—
Not, where mistaken Glory, in the field
Rears her red banner, be thou ever found;
But, against proud Oppression raise the shield
Of Patriot daring—So shalt thou renown'd
For the best virtues live; or that denied
May'st die, as Hampden or as Sydney died!

SONNET LXXVII. TO THE INSECT OF THE GOSSAMER.

Small, viewless Æronaut, that by the line
Of Gossamer suspended, in mid air
Float'st on a sun beam—Living Atom, where
Ends thy breeze-guided voyage;—with what design
In Æther dost thou launch thy form minute,
Mocking the eye?—Alas! before the veil
Of denser clouds shall hide thee, the pursuit
Of the keen Swift may end thy fairy sail!—
Thus on the golden thread that Fancy weaves
Buoyant, as Hope's illusive flattery breathes,
The young and visionary Poet leaves
Life's dull realities, while sevenfold wreaths
Of rainbow-light around his head revolve.
Ah! soon at Sorrow's touch the radiant dreams dissolve!

SONNET LXXVIII. SNOWDROPS.

Wan Heralds of the Sun and Summer gale!
That seem just fallen from infant Zephyrs' wing;
Not now, as once, with heart revived I hail
Your modest buds, that for the brow of Spring
Form the first simple garland—Now no more
Escaping for a moment all my cares,
Shall I, with pensive, silent step, explore
The woods yet leafless; where to chilling airs
Your green and pencil'd blossoms, trembling, wave.
Ah! ye soft, transient children of the ground,
More fair was she on whose untimely grave
Flow my unceasing tears! Their varied round
The Seasons go; while I through all repine:
For fixt regret, and hopeless grief are mine.

SONNET LXXIX. TO THE GODDESS OF BOTANY.

Of Folly weary, shrinking from the view
Of Violence and Fraud, allow'd to take
All peace from humble life; I would forsake
Their haunts for ever, and, sweet Nymph! with you
Find shelter; where my tired, and tear-swoln eyes,
Among your silent shades of soothing hue,
Your “bells and florets of unnumber'd dyes”
Might rest—And learn the bright varieties
That from your lovely hands are fed with dew;
And every veined leaf, that trembling sighs
In mead or woodland; or in wilds remote,
Or lurk with mosses in the humid caves,
Mantle the cliffs, on dimpling rivers float,
Or stream from coral rocks beneath the Ocean waves.

SONNET LXXX. TO THE INVISIBLE MOON.

Dark and conceal'd art thou, soft Evening's Queen,
And Melancholy's votaries that delight
To watch thee, gliding thro' the blue serene,
Now vainly seek thee on the brow of night—
Mild Sorrow, such as Hope has not forsook,
May love to muse beneath thy silent reign;
But I prefer from some steep rock to look
On the obscure and fluctuating main,
What time the martial star with lurid glare,
Portentous, gleams above the troubled deep;
Or the red comet shakes his blazing hair;
Or on the fire-ting'd waves the lightnings leap;
While thy fair beams illume another sky,
And shine for beings less accurst than I.

SONNET LXXXI.

[He may be envied, who with tranquil breast]

He may be envied, who with tranquil breast
Can wander in the wild and woodland scene,
When Summer's glowing hands have newly drest
The shadowy forests, and the copses green;
Who, unpursued by care, can pass his hours
Where briony and woodbine fringe the trees,
On thymy banks reposing, while the bees
Murmur “their fairy tunes in praise of flowers;”
Or on the rock with ivy clad, and fern
That overhangs the osier-whispering bed
Of some clear current, bid his wishes turn
From this bad world; and by calm reason led,
Knows, in refined retirement, to possess
By friendship hallow'd—rural happiness!

SONNET LXXXII. TO THE SHADE OF BURNS.

Mute is thy wild harp, now, O Bard sublime!
Who, amid Scotia's mountain solitude,
Great Nature taught to “build the lofty rhyme,”
And even beneath the daily pressure, rude,
Of labouring Poverty, thy generous blood,
Fired with the love of freedom—Not subdued
Wert thou by thy low fortune: But a time
Like this we live in, when the abject chime
Of echoing Parasite is best approved,
Was not for thee—Indignantly is fled
Thy noble Spirit; and no longer moved
By all the ills o'er which thine heart has bled,
Associate worthy of the illustrious dead,
Enjoys with them “the Liberty it loved.”

SONNET LXXXIII. THE SEA VIEW.

The upland Shepherd, as reclined he lies
On the soft turf that clothes the mountain brow,
Marks the bright Sea-line mingling with the skies;
Or from his course celestial, sinking slow,
The Summer-Sun in purple radiance low,
Blaze on the western waters; the wide scene
Magnificent, and tranquil, seems to spread
Even o'er the Rustic's breast a joy serene,
When, like dark plague-spots by the Demons shed,
Charged deep with death, upon the waves, far seen,
Move the war-freighted ships; and fierce and red,
Flash their destructive fires—The mangled dead
And dying victims then pollute the flood.
Ah! thus man spoils Heaven's glorious works with blood!

SONNET LXXXIV. TO THE MUSE.

Wilt thou forsake me who in life's bright May
Lent warmer lustre to the radiant morn;
And even o'er Summer scenes by tempests torn,
Shed with illusive light the dewy ray
Of pensive pleasure?—Wilt thou, while the day
Of saddening Autumn closes, as I mourn
In languid, hopeless sorrow, far away
Bend thy soft step, and never more return?—
Crush'd to the earth, by bitterest anguish prest,
From my faint eyes thy graceful form recedes;
Thou canst not heal an heart like mine that bleeds;
But, when in quiet earth that heart shall rest,
Haply may'st thou one sorrowing vigil keep,
Where Pity and Remembrance bend and weep!

SONNET LXXXV.

[The fairest flowers are gone! for tempests fell]

The fairest flowers are gone! for tempests fell,
And with wild wing swept some unblown away,
While on the upland lawn or rocky dell
More faded in the day-star's ardent ray;
And scarce the copse, or hedge-row shade beneath,
Or by the runnel's grassy course, appear
Some lingering blossoms of the earlier year,
Mingling bright florets, in the yellow wreath
That Autumn with his poppies and his corn
Binds on his tawny temples—So the schemes
Rais'd by fond Hope in youth's unclouded morn,
While sanguine youth enjoys delusive dreams,
Experience withers; till scarce one remains
Flattering the languid heart, where only Reason reigns!

SONNET LXXXVI. WRITTEN NEAR A PORT ON A DARK EVENING.

Huge vapours brood above the clifted shore,
Night on the Ocean settles, dark and mute,
Save where is heard the repercussive roar
Of drowsy billows, on the rugged foot
Or rocks remote; or still more distant tone
Of seamen in the anchor'd bark that tell
The watch reliev'd; or one deep voice alone
Singing the hour, and bidding “Strike the bell,”
All is black shadow, but the lucid line
Mark'd by the light surf on the level sand,
Or where afar the ship-lights faintly shine
Like wandering fairy fires, that oft on land
Mislead the Pilgrim—Such the dubious ray
That wavering Reason lends, in life's long darkling way.

SONNET LXXXVII. WRITTEN IN OCTOBER.

The blasts of Autumn as they scatter round
The faded foliage of another year,
And muttering many a sad and solemn sound,
Drive the pale fragments o'er the stubble sere,
Are well attuned to my dejected mood;
(Ah! better far than airs that breathe of Spring!)
While the high rooks, that hoarsely clamouring
Seek in black phalanx the half-leafless wood,
I rather hear, than that enraptured lay
Harmonious, and of Love and Pleasure born,
Which from the golden furze, or flowering thorn
Awakes the Shepherd in the ides of May;
Nature delights me most when most she mourns,
For never more to me the Spring of Hope returns!

SONNET LXXXVIII. NEPENTHE.

Oh! for imperial Polydamna's art,
Which to bright Helen was in Egypt taught,
To mix with magic power the oblivious draught
Of force to staunch the bleeding of the heart,
And to Care's wan and hollow cheek impart
The smile of happy youth, uncursed with thought.
Potent indeed the charm that could appease
Affection's ceaseless anguish, doom'd to weep
O'er the cold grave; or yield even transient ease
By soothing busy Memory to sleep!
—Around me those who surely must have tried
Some charm of equal power, I daily see,
But still to me Oblivion is denied,
There's no Nepenthe, now, on earth for me.

SONNET LXXXIX. TO THE SUN.

Whether awaken'd from unquiet rest
I watch “the opening eyelids of the Morn,”
When thou, O Sun! from Ocean's silver'd breast
Emerging, bidst another day be born—
Or whether in thy path of cloudless blue,
Thy noontide fires I mark with dazzled eyes;
Or to the West thy radiant course pursue,
Veil'd in the gorgeous broidery of the skies,
Celestial lamp! thy influence bright and warm
That renovates the world with life and light
Shines not for me—for never more the form
I loved—so fondly loved, shall bless my sight;
And nought thy rays illumine, now can charm
My misery, or to day convert my night!

SONNET XC. TO OBLIVION.

Forgetfulness! I would thy hand could close
These eyes that turn reluctant from the day;
So might this painful consciousness decay,
And, with my memory, end my cureless woes.
Sister of Chaos and eternal Night!
Oblivion! take me to thy quiet reign,
Since robb'd of all that gave my soul delight,
I only ask exemption from the pain
Of knowing “such things were”—and are no more;
Of dwelling on the hours for ever fled,
And heartless, helpless, hopeless to deplore
“Pale misery living, joy and pleasure dead:”
While dragging thus unwish'd a length of days,
“Death seems prepared to strike, yet still delays.”

SONNET XCI. REFLECTIONS ON SOME DRAWINGS OF PLANTS.

I can in groups these mimic flowers compose,
These bells and golden eyes, embathed in dew;
Catch the soft blush that warms the early Rose,
Or the pale Iris cloud with veins of blue;
Copy the scallop'd leaves, and downy stems,
And bid the pencil's varied shades arrest
Spring's humid buds, and Summer's musky gems:
But, save the portrait on my bleeding breast,
I have no semblance of that form adored,
That form, expressive of a soul divine,
So early blighted; and while life is mine,
With fond regret, and ceaseless grief deplored—
That grief, my angel! with too faithful art
Enshrines thy image in thy Mother's heart.

SONNET XCII. WRITTEN AT BIGNOR PARK IN SUSSEX, IN AUGUST, 1799.

Low murmurs creep along the woody vale,
The tremulous Aspens shudder in the breeze,
Slow o'er the downs the leaden vapours sail,
While I, beneath these old paternal trees,
Mark the dark shadows of the threaten'd storm,
As gathering clouds o'erveil the morning sun;
They pass!—But oh! ye visions bright and warm
With which even here my sanguine youth begun,
Ye are obscured for ever!—And too late
The poor Slave shakes the unworthy bonds away
Which crush'd her!—Lo! the radiant star of day
Lights up this lovely scene anew—My fate
Nor hope nor joy illumines—Nor for me
Return those rosy hours which here I used to see!