Works

to -----.

Hither led by fancy's hand,
Once again I seem to stand
In that hall in which this eye,
Blind before to beauty's ray,
Lighted up in ecstasy
Instantly it gazed on thee;...

Finite to fail, but infinite to venture.
For the one ship that struts the shore
Many's the gallant, overwhelmed creature
Nodding in navies nevermore.

Thus to the Muses spoke the Cyprian Dame,
Adorn my altars, and revere my name.
My son shall else assume his potent darts;
Twang goes the bow; my girls have at your hearts.
The Muses answer'd Venus, We deride...

Dedication.

'Vilia miretur vulgus; mihi flavus Apollo
Pocula Castalia plena ministret aqua.'

TO THE
RIGHT HONORABLE HENRY WRIOTHESLY,
EARL OF SOUTHAMPTON, AND BARON OF TICHFIELD.
...

How admirable the day! The vast park swoons beneath the burning eye of the sun, as youth beneath the lordship of love....

Venus by Adonis' side
Crying kiss'd, and kissing cried,
Wrung her hands and tore her hair
For Adonis dying there.

Stay (quoth she) O stay and live!
Nature surely doth not give...

I marked where lovely Venus and her court
With song and dance and merry laugh went by;
Weightless, their wingless feet seemed made to fly,
Bound from the ground and in mid air to sport....

When Cloe's Picture was to Venus shown;
Surpriz'd, the Goddess took it for Her own.
And what, said She, does this bold Painter mean?
When was I Bathing thus, and Naked seen?
...

Down the long hall she glistens like a star,
The foam-born mother of Love, transfixed to stone,
Yet none the less immortal, breathing on.
Time's brutal hand hath maimed but could not mar....

Beauties, have ye seen this toy,
Called Love, a little boy,
Almost naked, wanton, blind;
Cruel now, and then as kind?
If he be amongst ye, say?
He is Venus' runaway.
...

UN JOUR DIT UN AUTEUR, ETC.

Once (says an author--where I need not say)
Two travellers found an oyster in their way;
Both fierce, both hungry; the dispute grew strong,...

Avid of life and love, insatiate vagabond,
With quest too furious for the graal he would have won,
He flung himself at the eternal sky, as one
Wrenching his chains but impotent to burst the bond.
...

I

Beneath the concave of an April sky,
When all the fields with freshest green were dight,
Appeared, in presence of the spiritual eye
That aids or supersedes our grosser sight,...

The Heavenly Circuit; Berenice's Hair;
Tent-pole of Eden; the tent's drapery;
Symbolical glory of the earth and air!
The Father and His angelic hierarchy
That made the magnitude and glory there...

Past ruin'd Ilion Helen lives,
Alcestis rises from the shades;
Verse calls them forth; 'tis verse that gives
Immortal youth to mortal maids.

Soon shall Oblivion's deepening veil...

1

Friends
The old word is dead.
The old books are dead.
Our speech with holes like worn-out shoes is dead.
Dead is the mind that led to defeat.

2

Our poetry has gone sour....

When first I loved, I gave my very soul
Utterly unreserved to Love's control,
But Love deceived me, wrenched my youth away
And made the gold of life for ever grey.
Long I lived lonely, yet I tried in vain...

Verse-making was least of my virtues: I viewed with despair
Wealth that never yet was but might be, all that verse-making were
If the life would but lengthen to wish, let the mind be laid bare....

Vitae summa brevis spem nos vetat incohare longam

They are not long, the weeping and the laughter.
Love and desire and hate:
I think they have no portion in us after
We pass the gate.
...

Sent by Lord Melcombe to Dr. Young, Not Long Before His Lordship's Death.(68)


Kind companion of my youth,
Lov'd for genius, worth, and truth!
Take what friendship can impart,...