Heaves my poor shatter'd bark. I go, Undaunted-whither? Morn shall shew, Hope, farewell! 1810. SONG. WOMAN! dear Woman! in whose name Wife, Sister, Mother meet: Thine is the heart by earliest claim, And thine its latest beat. In thee the angel virtues shine; Then be an angel's office thine, And lead the soul to heaven. From thee we draw our infant strength; Thou art our childhood's friend; And when the man unfolds at length, On thee his hopes depend. For round the heart thy power has spun A thousand dear mysterious ties. Then take the heart thy charms have won, And nurse it for the skies. SONG. O GIVE me back the flower I brought Its leaves, with nameless fancies fraught, Breathe fragrant memory. No, keep it it has bloom'd its hour; Nor can I bear to see, In dying languor, ev'n the flower That lives the type of thee. SONG. O SPARE me not-for I can bear To meet the sternness of thine eye; And, if I meet affection there, Can well endure its scrutiny. I fear it not: within my mind That fault alone thou canst not find, Yes; spare me not. I would not be From every lighter failing free, That might alarm or wound thy pride. Yet, still believe, if e'er I seem Absent or dull while thou art nigh, Ev'n then it is of thee I dream, For thee, in deep abstraction, sigh. If others, in that dreaming mood, My idle thoughts appear to share, I'm all thine own in solitude, And find my sweetest converse there. SONG. THROW, Father Time, thy hour-glass by! Can that tell how the minutes fly? I smile to see thy wither'd hand Mete out the moments sand by sand, As if thou couldst, with tyrant power, Fix the brief limits of an hour; As if those sands that ebb away, Hours, minutes, seconds, form'd a day. Oh, not by measure, but by weight, Feelings and thoughts, and joys and fears'Tis these make up our days and years: These to each winged fugitive Vitality and impulse give. The plastic mind, by secret spell, Shrinks or dilates the elfin shapes, -Throw, Father Time, thy hour-glass by. |