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[What fancy, or what flight of wingéd thought]
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


428

[What fancy, or what flight of wingéd thought]

What fancy, or what flight of wingéd thought,
O lady of my heart, hast thou to chime
Accordant with the flow of my poor rhyme?
Have my strange songs a dearer solace brought
Than those remembered lays thy childhood caught,
And treasured safely through disloyal time—
Lays of a sweeter tongue and fairer clime;
Pure as thy dreams, before our passion sought
And won the shadowy realm, and steeped thy sleep
In fiery visions and terrific throes
Of self-consuming love? My songs are foes
To peace and thee; yet thou dost bid me sweep
The torturing strings, although thy eyelids weep:
Find'st thou a pleasure in thy very woes?