arms pursue
With eager clasps, but loves he knows not who.
What could, fond youth, this helpless passion move?
What kindle in thee this unpitied love?
Thy own warm blush within the water glows,
With thee the coloured shadow comes and goes,
Its empty being on thyself relies;
_40
Step thou aside, and the frail charmer dies.
Still o'er the fountain's watery gleam he stood,
Mindless of sleep, and negligent of food;
Still viewed his face, and languished as he viewed.
At length he raised his head, and thus began
To vent his griefs, and tell the woods his pain.
'You trees,' says he, 'and thou surrounding grove,
Who oft have been the kindly scenes of love,
Tell me, if e'er within your shades did lie
A youth so tortured, so perplexed as I?
_50
I who before me see the charming fair,
Whilst there he stands, and yet he stands not there:
In such a maze of love my thoughts are lost;
And yet no bulwarked town, nor distant coast,
Preserves the beauteous youth from being seen,
No mountains rise, nor oceans flow between.
A shallow water hinders my embrace;
And yet the lovely mimic wears a face
That kindly smiles, and when I bend to join
My lips to his, he fondly bends to mine.
_60
Hear, gentle youth, and pity my complaint,
Come from thy well, thou fair inhabitant.
My charms an easy conquest have obtained
O'er other hearts, by thee alone disdained.
But why should I despair? I'm sure he burns
With equal flames, and languishes by turns.
Whene'er I stoop he offers at a kiss,
And when my arms I stretch, he stretches his.
His eye with pleasure on my face he keeps,
He smiles my smiles, and when I weep he weeps.
_70
Whene'er I speak, his moving lips appear
To utter something, which I cannot hear.
'Ah wretched me! I now begin too late
To find out all the long-perplexed deceit;
It is myself I love, myself I see;
The gay delusion is a part of me.
I kindle up the fires by which I burn,
And my own beauties from the well return.
Whom should I court? how utter my complaint?
Enjoyment but produces my restraint,
_80
And too much plenty makes me die for want.
How gladly would I from myself remove!
And at a distance set the thing I love.
My breast is warmed with such unusual fire,
I wish him absent whom I most desire.
And now I faint with grief; my fate draws nigh;
In all the pride of blooming youth I die.
Death will the s