What are all these kissings worth, If thou kiss not me? P. B. Shelley H CLXXXV ECHOES OW sweet the answer Echo makes When, roused by lute or horn, she wakes, And far away o'er lawns and lakes Goes answering light! Yet Love hath echoes truer far And far more sweet Than e'er, beneath the moonlight's star, Of horn or lute or soft guitar The songs repeat. 'Tis when the sigh, — in youth sincere And only then, The sigh that's breathed for one to hear Is by that one, that only Dear Breathed back again. T. Moore CLXXXVI A SERENADE H! County Guy, the hour is nigh, AH The sun has left the lea, The orange-flower perfumes the bower, The lark, his lay who trill'd all day, Breeze, bird, and flower confess the hour, The village maid steals through the shade To beauty shy, by lattice high, Now reigns o'er earth and sky, And high and low the influence know - Sir W. Scott CLXXXVII TO THE EVENING STAR G EM of the crimson-colour'd Even, Why at the closing gates of heaven So fair thy pensile beauty burns To Peace, to Pleasure, and to Love Thine is the breathing, blushing hour Chased by the soul-subduing power O! sacred to the fall of day Shine on her chosen green resort Shine on her sweetly scented road Shine where my charmer's sweeter breath Where, winnow'd by the gentle air Thus, ever thus, at day's decline SWI CLXXXVIII TO THE NIGHT WIFTLY walk over the western wave, Out of the misty eastern cave Where all the long and lone daylight Thou wovest dreams of joy and fear Wrap thy form in a mantle gray Blind with thine hair the eyes of day, Kiss her until she be wearied out, Then wander o'er city, and sea, and land When I arose and saw the dawn, I sigh'd for thee; When light rode high, and the dew was gone, And noon lay heavy on flower and tree, And the weary Day turn'd to his rest Lingering like an unloved guest, Thy brother Death came, and cried Thy sweet child Sleep, the filmy-eyed, Shall I nestle near thy side? Wouldst thou me? And I replied Death will come when thou art dead, Sleep will come when thou art fled; P. B. Shelley CLXXXIX TO A DISTANT FRIEND HY art thou silent! Is thy love a plant WHY Of such weak fibre that the treacherous air Yet have my thoughts for thee been vigilant, Speak! though this soft warm heart, once free to hold Than a forsaken bird's-nest fill'd with snow 'Mid its own bush of leafless eglantine — Speak, that my torturing doubts their end may know ! W. Wordsworth 15 |