Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, WRITTEN AFTER LEAVING HER AT NEW BURNS, by WILLIAM COWPER


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

WRITTEN AFTER LEAVING HER AT NEW BURNS, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: How quick the change from joy to woe
Last Line: You best may tell who feel the same.
Subject(s): Absence; Grief; Separation; Isolation; Sorrow; Sadness


HOW quick the change from joy to woe!
How chequered is our lot below!
Seldom we view the prospect fair,
Dark clouds of sorrow, pain, and care
(Some pleasing intervals between,
Scowl over more than half the scene.
Last week with Delia, gentle maid,
Far hence in happier fields I strayed,
While on her dear enchanting tongue
Soft sounds of grateful welcome hung,
For absence had withheld it long.
"Welcome, my long-lost love," she said,
"E'er since our adverse fates decreed
That we must part, and I must mourn
Till once more blessed by thy return,
Love, on whose influence I relied
For all the transports I enjoyed,
Has played the cruel tyrant's part
And turned tormentor to my heart.
But let me hold thee to my breast,
Dear partner of my joy and rest,
And not a pain, and not a fear
Or anxious doubt, shall enter there."
Happy, thought I, the favoured youth,
Blessed with such undissembled truth!
Five suns successive rose and set,
And saw no monarch in his state,
Wrapped in the blaze of majesty,
So free from every care as I.

Next day the scene was overcast;
Such day till then I never passed,
For on that day,--relentless fate!--
Delia and I must separate.
Yet ere we looked our last farewell,
From her dear lips this comfort fell:
"Fear not that time, where'er we rove,
Or absence, shall abate my love."
And can I doubt, my charming maid,
As unsincere what you have said?
Banished from thee to what I hate,
Dull neighbours and insipid chat,
No joy to cheer me, none in view,
But the dear hope of meeting you;
And that through passion's optic scene,
With ages interposed between;
Blessed with the kind support you give,
'Tis by your promised truth I live;
How deep my woes, how fierce my flame,
You best may tell who feel the same.





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