Classic and Contemporary Poetry
LINES ON RECEIVING A SEAL WITH THE CAMPBELL CREST FROM K.M., BEFORE HER MARRIAGE, by THOMAS CAMPBELL Poet Analysis Poet's Biography First Line: This wax returns not back more fair Last Line: The all-in-all of life -- content! Subject(s): Gifts & Giving | ||||||||
THIS wax returns not back more fair Th' impression of the gift you send, Than stamped upon my thoughts I bear The image of your worth, my friend! We are not friends of yesterday: But poets' fancies are a little Disposed to heat and cool, (they say,) -- By turns impressible and brittle. Well! should its frailty e'er condemn My heart to prize or please you less, Your type is still the sealing gem, And mine the waxen brittleness. What transcripts of my weal and wo This little signet yet may lock, -- What utterances to friend or foe, In reason's calm or passion's shock! What scenes of life's yet curtained page May own its confidential die, Whose stamp awaits th' unwritten page, And feelings of futurity! -- Yet wheresoe'er my pen I lift To date the epistolary sheet, The blest occasion of the gift Shall make its recollection sweet; Sent when the star that rules your fates Hath reached its influence most benign -- When every heart congratulates, And none more cordially than mine. So speed my song -- marked with the crest That erst the advent'rous Norman wore, Who won the Lady of the West, The daughter of Macaillan Mor. Crest of my sires! whose blood it sealed With glory in the strife of swords, Ne'er may the scroll that bears it yield Degenerate thoughts or faithless words! Yet little might I prize the stone, If it but typed the feudal tree From whence, a scattered leaf, I'm blown In Fortune's mutability. No! -- but it tells me of a heart Allied by friendship's living tie; A prize beyond the herald's art -- Our soul-sprung consanguinity! KATH'RINE! to many an hour of mine Light wings and sunshine you have lent; And so adieu, and still be thine The all-in-all of life -- Content! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE GIVEAWAY by PHYLLIS MCGINLEY A VALENTINE FOR ERNEST MANN by NAOMI SHIHAB NYE SO IT'S TODAY by LAURE-ANNE BOSSELAAR EVERYBODY KNOWS by DAVID IGNATOW ON VIOLET'S WAFERS, SENT ME WHEN I WAS ILL by SIDNEY LANIER TO MY CLASS: ON CERTAIN FRUITS AND FLOWERS SENT ... SICKNESS by SIDNEY LANIER THE GIFT; FOR MY DAUGHTER by GREGORY ORR BATTLE OF THE BALTIC by THOMAS CAMPBELL DOWNFALL OF POLAND [FALL OF WARSAW, 1794] by THOMAS CAMPBELL |
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