Pagina-afbeeldingen
PDF
ePub

Dread star! that came, amid a night of mirth,

A red Dædalion on the timid Earth.

"We came—and to thy Earth-but not to us
Be given our lady's bidding to discuss :
We came, my love; around, above, below,
Gay fire-fly of the night we come and go,
Nor ask a reason save the angel-nod

She grants to us, as granted by her God—
But, Angelo, than thine grey Time unfurled
Never his fairy wing o'er fairier world!
Dim was its little disk, and angel eyes
Alone could see the phantom in the skies,
When first Al Aaraaf knew her course to be
Headlong thitherward o'er the starry sea-
But when its glory swelled upon the sky,
As glowing Beauty's bust beneath man's eye,
We paused before the heritage of men,

And thy star trembled-as doth Beauty then!"

Thus, in discourse, the lovers whiled away

The night that waned and waned and brought no day.

They fell for Heaven to them no hope imparts

Who hear not for the beating of their hearts.

SONNET-TO SCIENCE.

[graphic]

CIENCE! true daughter of Old Time thou art!
Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.
Why preyest thou thus upon the poet's heart,

Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?

How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise,

Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering

To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies,

Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing?

Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car?
And driven the Hamadryad from the wood
To seek a shelter in some happier star?

Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood,
The Elfin from the green grass, and from me
The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?

[graphic][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]
« VorigeDoorgaan »