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Eyes that had given light and life erewhile

To those above them, but now dim with tears
And wakefulness. Again he spake of joy

Eternal. At that word, that sad word, joy,
Faithful and fond her bosom heaved once more;
Her head fell back; and now a loud deep sob
Swelled thro' the darkened chamber; 'twas not hers.

CORINNA, FROM ATHENS, TO TANAGRA.

[From Pericles and Aspasia.]

I.

Tanagra! think not I forget

Thy beautifully-storied streets;
Be sure my memory bathes yet

In clear Thermodon, and yet greets
The blythe and liberal shepherd boy,
Whose sunny bosom swells with joy
When we accept his matted rushes

Upheaved with sylvan fruit; away he bounds, and blushes.

2.

I promise to bring back with me

What thou with transport will receive,

The only proper gift for thee,

Of which no mortal shall bereave

In later times thy mouldering walls,
Until the last old turret falls;

A crown, a crown from Athens won,

A crown no god can wear, beside Latona's son.

VOL. IV.

3.

There may be cities who refuse

To their own child the honours due,
And look ungently on the Muse;

But ever shall those cities rue

I i

The dry, unyielding, niggard breast,
Offering no nourishment, no rest,

To that young head which soon shall rise
Disdainfully, in might and glory, to the skies.

4.

Sweetly where caverned Dirce flows

Do white-armed maidens chaunt my lay,
Flapping the while with laurel-rose
The honey-gathering tribes away;
And sweetly, sweetly, Attick tongues
Lisp your Corinna's early songs;

To her with feet more graceful come

The verses that have dwelt in kindred breasts at home.

5.

O let thy children lean aslant

Against the tender mother's knee,
And gaze into her face, and want

To know what magic there can be
In words that urge some eyes to dance,
While others as in holy trance

Look up to heaven; be such my praise!

Why linger? I must haste, or lose the Delphick bays.

CLEONE TO Aspasia.

We mind not how the sun in the mid-sky
Is hastening on; but when the golden orb
Strikes the extreme. of earth, and when the gulphs
Of air and ocean open to receive him,
Dampness and gloom invade us; then we think
Ah! thus it is with youth. Too fast his feet
Run on for sight; hour follows hour; fair maid
Succeeds fair maid; bright eyes bestar his couch;
The cheerful horn awakens him; the feast,

The revel, the entangling dance, allure,

And voices mellower than the Muse's own

Heap up his buoyant bosom on their wave. A little while, and then.... Ah youth! youth! youth! Listen not to my words... but stay with me! When thou art gone, Life may go too; the sigh That rises is for thee, and not for Life.

THE MAID'S LAMENT.

[From the Examination of Shakespeare.]

I loved him not; and yet now he is gone

I feel I am alone.

I checked him while he spoke; yet could he speak,
Alas, I would not check.

For reasons not to love him once I sought
And wearied all my thought

To vex myself and him; I now would give
My love, could he but live

Who lately lived for me, and when he found
'Twas vain, in holy ground

He hid his face amid the shades of death.
I waste for him my breath

Who wasted his for me; but mine returns,
And this lorn bosom burns

With stifling heat, heaving it up in sleep,
And waking me to weep

Tears that had melted his soft heart; for years
Wept he as bitter tears.

'Merciful God!' such was his latest prayer,

'These may she never share!'

Quieter is his breath, his breast more cold

Than daisies in the mould,

Where children spell, athwart the churchyard gate,
His name, and life's brief date.

Pray for him, gentle souls, whoe'er you be,
And, O, pray too for me.

Ye who have toiled uphill to reach the haunt
Of other men who lived in other days,
Whether the ruins of a citadel

Raised on the summit by Pelasgic hands,
Or chamber of the distaff and the song...
Ye will not tell what treasure there ye found,
But I will.

Ye found there the viper laid
Full-length, flat-headed, on a sunny slab,
Nor loth to hiss at ye while crawling down.
Ye saw the owl flap the loose ivy leaves

And, hooting, shake the berries on your heads.
Now, was it worth your while to mount so high?
Merely to say ye did it, and to ask

If those about ye ever did the like?
Believe me, O my friends, 'twere better far
To stretch your limbs along the level sand
As they do, where small children scoop the drift,
Thinking it must be gold, where curlews soar
And scales drop glistening from the prey above.

Twenty years hence my eyes may grow
If not quite dim, yet rather so,

Yet yours from others they shall know
Twenty years hence.

Twenty years hence, though it may hap
That I be called to take a nap

In a cool cell where thunder clap

Was never heard,

There breathe but o'er my arch of grass,

A not too sadly sighed 'Alas!'

And I shall catch ere you can pass

That winged word.

Lately our poets loitered in green lanes,
Content to catch the ballad of the plains;
I fancied I had strength enough to climb
A loftier station at no distant time,
And might securely from intrusion doze

Upon the flowers thro' which Ilissus flows.
In those pale olive grounds all voices cease,
And from afar dust fills the paths of Greece.
My slumber broken and my doublet torn,
I find the laurel also bears a thorn.

When Helen first saw wrinkles in her face
('Twas when some fifty long had settled there
And intermarried and brancht off awide),
She threw herself upon her couch, and wept ;
On this side hung her head, and over that
Listlessly she let fall the faithless brass

That made the men as faithless.

But when you

Found them, or fancied them, and would not hear
That they were only vestiges of smiles,

Or the impression of some amorous hair
Astray from cloistered curls and roseat band,
Which had been lying there all night perhaps
Upon a skin so soft... No, no, you said,
Sure, they are coming, yes, are come, are here ...
Well, and what matters it... while you are too!

Say ye, that years roll on and ne'er return?
Say ye, the Sun who leaves them all behind,
Their great creator, cannot bring one back
With all his force, tho' he draw worlds around?...
Witness me, little streams! that meet before
My happy dwelling; witness, Africo

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