Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY, SELECTION, by JAMES MARRIOTT


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY, SELECTION, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Ah fleeting joys! How soon those hopes were o'er
Last Line: And with thy beauties strives to mix her fame.
Alternate Author Name(s): Marriott, Sir Jame
Subject(s): Death; Dead, The


AH fleeting joys! how soon those hopes were o'er!
We doomed to mourn, and she to charm no more.
The waning moon shall fill her wasted horn,
And Nature's radiance gild the orient morn,
The smiling spring with charms renew'd appear,
The sleeping blossoms haste to deck the year,
But bloom no more this fair departed flower,
Nor wak'd by genial sun, nor vernal shower.

How vain, alas! was all thy father's art,
Vain were the sighs which swell'd thy mother's heart.
Again I see thee just expiring lie,
Pale thy cold lip, half clos'd thy languid eye,
Thy guardian Innocence beside thee stands,
And patient Faith uplifts her holy hands,
Teach thee with smiles to meet the stroke of death,
Calm all thy pangs, and ease thy struggling breath.

Resign'd, dear maid, to earth's maternal breast,
May sister Seraphs chaunt thy soul to rest.
There shall the constant Amaranthus bloom,
And wings of Zephyrs shed the morn's perfume.
O'er thy sad hearse, fair emblems of the dead,
By virgin hands are dying lilies shed.
The weeping Graces shall thy tomb surround;
The Loves with broken darts shall strew the ground;
In vain for thee they wak'd the fond desires,
Wove myrtle wreaths, and fann'd their purer fires.
The youthful God, who joins the nuptial bands,
In vain expecting near his altar stands;
Fate spread the cloud: his torch extinct, he flies,
And veils with saffron robe his streaming eyes.

Yet O, while crown'd with never fading flowers,
Thy spirit wanders through Elysian bowers,
If plaintive sounds of mortal grief below
Reach the blest seats, and waft our tender woe,
Hear, happy shade; while thus our mortal lays
This monument of soft affection raise.
By gentle ties of kindred birth allied,
The Muse that sports on Camus' willow'd side
In Memory's lofty dome inscribes thy name,
And with thy beauties strives to mix her fame.





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