I sigh, fair injur'd stranger! for thy fate; But what shall sighs avail thee? thy poor heart, 'Mid all the 'pomp and circumstance' of state, Shivers in nakedness. Unbidden, start Sad recollections of Hope's garish dream, That shaped a seraph form, and named it Love, Its hues gay-varying, as the orient beam Varies the neck of Cytherea's dove. To one soft accent of domestic joy Poor are the shouts that shake the high-arch'd dome; Those plaudits that thy public path annoy, Alas! they tell thee -- Thou'rt a wretch at home! O then retire, and weep! Their very woes Solace the guiltless. Drop the pearly flood On thy sweet infant, as the full-blown rose, Surcharg'd with dew, bends o'er its neighbouring bud. And ah! that Truth some holy spell might lend To lure thy Wanderer from the Syren's power; Then bid your souls inseparably blend Like two bright dew-drops meeting in a flower. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MACDONALD'S RAID - A.D. 1780 by PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE GOOD AND BAD LUCK by HEINRICH HEINE REPRESSION OF WAR EXPERIENCE by SIEGFRIED SASSOON MOONRISE IN THE ROCKIES by ROUTH PICKETT BRADLEY MASQUE AT THE MARRIAGE OF THE EARL OF SOMERSET: SONG (1) by THOMAS CAMPION IN THE FANTASY by LE BARON COOKE |