THE POET'S WINTER SONG TO HIS WIFE. THE birds that sang so sweet in the summer skies are fled, And we trample 'neath our feet leaves that flutter'd o'er our head; The verdant fields of June wear a winding-sheet of white, The stream has lost its tune, and the glancing waves their light. We too, my faithful wife, feel our winter coming on, And our dreams of early life like the summer birds are gone; My head is silver'd o'er, while thine eyes their fire have lost, And thy voice, so sweet of yore, is enchain'd by age's frost. But the founts that live and shoot through the bosom of the earth, Still prepare each seed and root to give future flowers their birth; And we, my dearest Jane, spite of age's wintry blight, In our bosoms will retain Spring's florescence and delight. The seeds of love and lore that we planted in our youth, Shall develop more and more their attractiveness and truth; The springs beneath shall run, though the snows be on our head, For Love's declining sun shall with Friendship's rays be fed. Thus as happy as when young shall we both grow old, my wife, On one bough united hung of the fruitful Tree of Life; May we never disengage through each change of wind and weather, Till in ripeness of old age we both drop to earth together! VOL. I. SONG TO FANNY. NATURE! thy fair and smiling face Has now a double power to bless, For 'tis the glass in which I trace Her heav'nly eyes above me shine, The rose reflects her modest blush, She breathes in every eglantine, She sings in every warbling thrush. That her dear form alone I see Need not excite surprise in any, For Fanny's all the world to me, And all the world to me is Fanny. SONG TO FANNY. THY bloom is soft, thine eyes are bright, And rose-buds are thy lips, my Fanny, Thy glossy hair is rich with light, Thy form unparagon'd by any; But thine is not the brief array Of charms which time is sure to borrow, Which accident may blight to-day, Or sickness undermine to-morrow. No-thine is that immortal grace Which ne'er shall pass from thy possession, That moral beauty of the face Which constitutes its sweet expression; This shall preserve thee what thou art, When age thy blooming tints has shaded, For while thy looks reflect thy heart, How can their charms be ever faded? Nor, Fanny, can a love like mine With time decay, in sickness falter; "Tis like thy beauty-half divine, Born of the soul, and cannot alter: For when the body's mortal doom Our earthly pilgrimage shall sever, Our spirits shall their loves resume, United in the skies for ever. |