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As when the savage, who his drowsy frame
Had basked beneath the Sun's unclouded flame,
Awakes amid the troubles of the air,

The skiey deluge, and white lightning's glare-
Aghast he scours before the tempest's sweep,
And sad recalls the sunny hour of sleep ;-
So tossed by storms along Life's wildering way,
Mine eye reverted views that cloudless day,
When by my native brook I wont to rove,
While Hope with kisses nursed the Infant Love.

Dear native brook! like Peace, so placidly
Smoothing through fertile fields thy current meek!
Dear native brook! where first young Poesy
Stared wildly eager in her noon-tide dream!
Where blameless pleasures dimple Quiet's cheek,
As water-lilies ripple thy slow stream!

Dear native haunts! where Virtue still is gay,
Where Friendship's fix'd star sheds a mellowed ray,
Where Love a crown of thornless Roses wears,
Where softened Sorrow smiles within her tears;
And Memory, with a Vestal's chaste employ,
Unceasing feeds the lambent flame of joy!
No more your sky-larks melting from the sight
Shall thrill the attuned heartstring with delight-
No more shall deck your pensive Pleasures sweet
With wreaths of sober hue my evening seat.
Yet dear to Fancy's eye your varied scene
Of wood, hill, dale, and sparkling brook between!
Yet sweet to Fancy's ear the warbled song,
That soars on Morning's wing your vales among.

Scenes of my Hope! the aching eye ye leave
Like yon bright hues that paint the clouds of eve!

Tearful and saddening with the saddened blaze Mine eye the gleam pursues with wistful gaze: Sees shades on shades with deeper tint impend,

Till chill and damp the moonless night descend.

THE ROSE.

S late each flower that sweetest blows

AS

I plucked, the Garden's pride!

Within the petals of a rose

A sleeping Love I spied.

Around his brows a beamy wreath
Of many a lucent hue;

All purple glowed his cheek, beneath,
Inebriate with dew.

I softly seized the unguarded Power,
Nor scared his balmy rest:

And placed him, caged within the flower,
On spotless Sara's breast.

But when unweeting of the guile
Awoke the prisoner sweet,
He struggled to escape awhile,
And stamped his faery feet.

Ah! soon the soul-entrancing sight
Subdued the impatient boy!

He gazed! he thrilled with deep delight!
Then clapped his wings for joy.

"And O!" he cried-" of magic kind

What charms this Throne endear!

Some other Love let Venus find

I'll fix my empire here,"

ONE

THE KISS.

NE kiss, dear maid, I said, and sigh’d—
Your scorn the little boon denied.
Ah why refuse the blameless bliss ?
Can danger lurk within a kiss?
Yon viewless Wanderer of the vale,
The Spirit of the Western Gale,
At Morning's break, at Evening's close
Inhales the sweetness of the Rose,
And hovers o'er the uninjured Bloom
Sighing back the soft perfume.
Vigor to the Zephyr's wing

Her nectar-breathing Kisses fling;
And He the glitter of the Dew
Scatters on the Rose's hue,
Bashful, lo! she bends her head,
And darts a blush of deeper Red!

Too well those lovely lips disclose
The triumphs of the opening Rose;
O fair! O graceful! bid them prove
As passive to the breath of Love.
In tender accents; faint and low,
Well-pleased I hear the whispered "No!"
The whisper'd "No!"-how little meant!
Sweet Falsehood that endears Consent!
For on those lovely lips the while
Dawns the soft relenting smile,

And tempts with feign'd dissuasion coy
The gentle violence of Joy.

KISSES.

CUPID, if storying Legends tell aright,

Once framed a rich Elixir of Delight,

A Chalice o'er love-kindled flames he fix'd,
And in it nectar and ambrosia mix'd:

With these the magic dews, which Evening brings,
Brush'd from the Idalian Star by faery wings:
Each tender pledge of sacred Faith he joined,
Each gentler pleasure of th' unspotted mind-
Day-dreams, whose tints with sportive brightness
glow,

And Hope, the blameless Parasite of Woe.
The eyeless Chemist heard the process rise,
The steamy Chalice bubbled up in sighs;
Sweet sounds transpired, as when th' enamored
Dove

Pours the soft murm'ring of responsive love.
The finished work might Envy vainly blame,
And "Kisses" was the precious compound's name;
With half the God his Cyprian Mother blest,
And breathed on Sara's lovelier lips the rest.

TO THE NIGHTINGALE.

SISTER of love-lorn poets, Philomel!
How many bards in city garret pent,
While at their window they with downward eye
Mark the faint lamp-beam on the kennell'd mud,
And listen to the drowsy cry of watchmen,
Those hoarse, unfeathered nightingales of time!
How many wretched bards address thy name,
And her's, the full-orb'd queen, that shines above,

But I do hear thee, and the high bough mark,
Within whose mild moon-mellowed foliage hid,
Thou warblest sad thy pity-pleading strains.
O, I have listened, till my working soul,
Waked by those strains to thousand phantasies,
Absorbed, hath ceased to listen! Therefore oft
I hymn thy name; and with a proud delight
Oft will I tell thee, minstrel of the moon,

66

Most musical, most melancholy" bird!
That all thy soft diversities of tone,

Though sweeter far than the delicious airs
That vibrate from a white-armed lady's harp
What time the languishment of lonely love
Melts in her eye, and heaves her breast of snow,
Are not so sweet, as is the voice of her,

My Sara-best beloved of human kind!
When breathing the pure soul of tenderness,
She thrills me with the husband's promised name!

1794.

TO A YOUNG ASS.

ITS MOTHER BEING TETHERED NEAR IT.

POOR little Foal of an oppressed Race!

I love the languid Patience of thy face: And oft with gentle hand I give thee bread, And clap thy ragged Coat, and pat thy head. But what thy dulled Spirits hath dismayed, That never thou dost sport along the glade? And (most unlike the nature of things young) That earthward still thy moveless head is hung? Do thy prophetic Fears anticipate,

Meek Child of Misery! thy future fate?

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