Works

Kisse mee, Sweet: The wary lover
Can your favours keepe, and cover,
When the common courting jay
All your bounties will betray.
Kisse againe: no creature comes.
Kisse, and score up wealthy summes...

(Ode to Lycoris. May 1817)

Enough of climbing toil! Ambition treads
Here, as 'mid busier scenes, ground steep and rough,
Or slippery even to peril! and each step,
As we for most uncertain recompence...

12 o'Clock at Noon
Sept. 12, 1718.

SIR,
Perhaps you may wonder, I send you so soon
Another epistle; consider 'tis noon.
For all his acquaintance well know that friend Tom is,...

Pleasures newly found are sweet
When they lie about our feet:
February last, my heart
First at sight of thee was glad;
All unheard of as thou art,
Thou must needs, I think, have had,...

With little here to do or see
Of things that in the great world be,
Daisy! again I talk to thee,
For thou art worthy,
Thou unassuming Common-place
Of Nature, with that homely face,...

Enough of climbing toil! Ambition treads
Here, as 'mid busier scenes, ground steep and rough,
Or slippery even to peril! and each step,
As we for most uncertain recompence...

Dead, why defend thee, who in life
For thy worst foe hadst died;
Who, thy own name a word of strife,
Didst silent stand aside?

Grand in forgiveness, what to thee
The big world's puny prate!...

How quick the change from joy to woe,
How chequer'd is our lot below!
Seldom we view the prospect fair;
Dark clouds of sorrow, pain, and care
(Some pleasing intervals between),...

No wonder bards, both high and low,
From Byron down to ***** and me,
Should seek the fame which all bestow
On him whose task is praising thee.

Let but the theme be Jersey's eyes,...

Spare me thy vengeance, Galloway,
In quiet let me live:
I ask no kindness at thy hand,
For thou hast none to give.

Tinkle on, O sweet guitar,
Let the dancing fingers
Loiter where the low notes are
Blended with the singer's:
Let the midnight pour the moon's
Mellow wine of glory
Down upon him through the tune's...

Not in their houses stand the stars,
But o'er the pinnacles of thine!

Thy foes to hunt, thy enviers to strike down,
Poises Arcturus aloft morning and evening his spear.

Imitated from Horace, lib. i, ode 3.


So may my Lady's prayers prevail,
And Canning's too, and lucid Bragge's,
And Eldon beg a favoring gale
From Eolus, that older Bags,...

O ship of state
Shall new winds bear you back upon the sea?
What are you doing? Seek the harbor's lee
Ere 't is too late!

Do you bemoan
Your side was stripped of oarage in the blast?...

1.

Your pardon my friend,
If my rhymes did offend,
Your pardon a thousand times o'er,
From friendship I strove,
Your pangs to remove,
But I swear I will do so no more.

2.
...

Pansies, lilies, kingcups, daisies,
Let them live upon their praises;
Long as there's a sun that sets,
Primroses will have their glory;
Long as there are violets,
They will have a place in story:...

Warriors true, 'tis no false glory
For which now you peril life, -
For no worthless aim unholy,
Do ye plunge into the strife;
No unstable, fleeting vision
Bright before your gaze hath shone,...

Grave this deep in your hearts,
Forget not the tale of the past!
Never, never believe
That any will help you, or can,
Saving only yourselves!
What have the gentlemen done,
Peerless haters of wrong,...

If thou dislik'st the piece thou light'st on first,
Think that of all, that I have writ, the worst:
But if thou read'st my book unto the end,
And still do'st this and that verse, reprehend;...