Classic Poem

UNABLE TO SATISFY THE COVETOUS TEMPER OF
NEAERA, HE INTENDS TO MAKE A CAMPAIGN, AND
TRY, IF POSSIBLE, TO FORGET HER .

Adieu , ye walls, that guard my cruel fair,
No more I'll sit in rosy fetters bound,
My limbs have learnt the weight of arms to bear,
My rousing spirits feel the trumpet's sound.

Few are the maids, that now on merit smile,
On spoil and war is bent this iron age;
Yet pain and death attend on war and spoil,
Unsated vengeance, and remorseless rage.

To purchase spoil even love itself is sold,
Her lover's heart is least Neaera's care,
And I through war must seek detested gold,
Not for myself, but for my venal fair:

That while she bends beneath the weight of dress,
The stiffen'd robe may spoil her easy mein;
And art mistaken make her beauty less,
While still it hides some graces better seen.

But if such toys can win her lovely smile,
Hers be the wealth of Tagus' golden sand,
Hers the bright gems that glow in India's soil,
Hers the black sons of Afric's sultry land.

To please her eye let every loom contend,
For her be rifled ocean's pearly bed.
But where, alas! would idle fancy tend?
And soothe with dreams a youthful poet's head?

Let others buy the cold unloving maid,
In forc'd embraces act the tyrant's part,
While I their selfish luxury upbraid,
And scorn the person where I doubt the heart.

Thus warm'd by pride, I think I love no more,
And hide in threats the weakness of my mind:
In vain; — though Reason fly the hated door,
Yet Love, the coward Love, still lags behind.