University of Virginia Library

III. PART III.—HEAVEN-JOYS.

O Music! my delight!
My soul's supremest joy!
Let me lie to-night, to-night,
On thy bosom coy!
Let me lie all night awake,
Embalm'd in thy honey breath,
That wafts me up to Heaven,
In a wild ecstatic death.
Up! up! above the stars
With thee I float! I soar!

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To the shadow of God's throne!
To the world-bespangled floor!
Where sit the white-robed seraphs,
Singing for evermore!
O Music! oh, my life!
How beautiful art thou!
With the Love in thy deep, deep heart,
And the Wisdom on thy brow!
As I play with the golden hair
That falls o'er thy shoulders fair,
I deem that every thread
To my toying fingers given,
Is a ray of sunlight spread,
Or a string from the Harp of Heaven.
I feel thy beating heart,
And know, sweet lady mine,
That it throbs to the march of worlds,
With a harmony divine.

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I touch; but dare not kiss thee,
For the glow of thy burning eyes,
Lest I should yield my spirit
In my speechless ecstasies,
And be slain like a mortal lover
Who dares to raise his thought
To the beauty of a goddess,
Loving, but lightning-fraught!
Yet, since I'm born to die,
And to float into the Past,
Let me die on thy beating bosom,
My bride, my first and last!
Drinking thy whisper'd rapture,
Let me faint upon thy breast,
And melt away in echoes,
Immortal with the blest!