w
That you died for utter woe
And despair o'ermuch?
No! my face a marble bust!
As the Sphynx, impassioned, stern!--
Passions hid, as in an urn,
Burnt to bitter dust!
And I'll write him as he wrote,
Making, with his worded scorn,
Tyrant,--crowned with stinging thorn,--
His cold, cruel note.
"You'll forget," he says, "and I
Feel 'tis better for us twain:
It may give you some small pain,
But, 'twill soon be by.
"You are dark, and Maud is light;
I am dark; and it is said
Opposites are better wed;--
So I think I'm right."
"You are dark and Maud is fair!"
I could laugh at this excuse
If this aching, mad abuse
Were not more than hair!
But I'll write him as a-glad
Some few happy words and light,
Touching on some past delight,
That last year we had.
Not one line of broken vows,
Sighs or hurtful tears unshed,
Faithless lips far better dead,
Nor a withered rose.
But a rose, this _Perle_ to wear,--
_Perle des Jardins_ delicate
With faint fragrant life elate,--
When he weds her there.
So; 'tis finished! It is well!
Go, thou rose! I have no tear,
Kiss, or word for thee to bear,
And no woe to tell.
Only be thus full of life,
Cold and calm, impassionate,
Filled with neither love nor hate,
When he calls her wife!
OSSIAN'S POEMS.
Here I have heard on hills the battle clash
Roar to the windy sea that roared again:
When, drunk with wrath, upon the clanking plain
Barbaric kings did meet in war and dash
Their mailed thousands down, heard onset crash
Like crags contending 'gainst the battering main.
Torrents of helms, beaming like streams of rain,
Blue-billowing 'neath the pale moon's fitful flash;
Saw the scared moon hang over the black wood
Like a pale wreath of foam; shields, spears, and swords
Shoot green as meteors thro' the steely flood,
Or shine like ripples 'round their heathen lords
Standing like stubborn rocks, whence the wild wave
Of war circled in steel and foamed out brave on brave.
II.--IN MYTHIC SEAS.
IN MYTHIC SEAS.
'Neath saffron stars and satin skies, dark-blue,
Between dim sylvan isles, a happy two.
We sailed, and from the siren-haunted shore,
All mystic in i
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