A WIDOW bird sate mourning for her Love The frozen wind crept on above, The freezing stream below. There was no leaf upon the forest bare, No flower upon the ground, And little motion in the air Except the mill-wheel's sound. P. B. Shelley. DESERTED. YE banks and braes o' bonnie Doon, And I sae fu' o' care! Thou'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird That sings upon the bough; Thou minds me o' the happy days When my fause Luve was true. Thou'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird That sings beside thy mate; For sae I sat, and sae I sang, HOLLOW is the oak beside the sunny waters drooping; Thither came, when I was young, happy children trooping; Dream I now, or hear I now-far, their mellow whooping? Gay below the cowslip bank, see the billow dances; Farther, where the river glides by the wooded cover, Where the merlin singeth low, with the hawk above her, Came a foot and shone a smile-woe is me, the Lover! Leaflets on the hollow oak still as greenly quiver; IF thou wilt ease thine heart Then sleep, dear, sleep; And not a sorrow Hang any tear on your eyelashes; Lie still and deep, Sad soul, until the sea-wave washes The rim o' the sun to-morrow In eastern sky. But wilt thou cure thine heart Of love and all its smart, Then die, dear, die; 'Tis deeper, sweeter, Than on a rose-bank to lie dreaming With folded eye; And alone amid the beaming Of love's stars, thou'lt meet her In eastern sky. T. L. Beddoes. 108 A LAMENT. A LAMENT. SWIFTER far than summer's flight, As the earth when leaves are dead, The swallow Summer comes again, To fly with thee, false as thou: Lilies for a bridal bed, Pansies let my flowers be: On the living grave I bear Waste one hope, one fear, for me. P. B. Shelley. |