Classic Poem

In these sad hours, a prey to ceaseless pain,
While feverish pulses leap in ev'ry vein,
When each faint breath the last short effort seems
Of life just parting from my feeble limbs;
How wild soe'er my wand'ring thoughts may be,
Still, gentle Delia, still they turn on thee!
At length if, slumb'ring to a short repose,
A sweet oblivion frees me from my woes,
Thy form appears, thy footsteps I pursue,
Through springy vales, and meadows wash'd in dew;
Thy arm supports me to the fountain's brink,
Where, by some secret pow'r forbid to drink,
Gasping with thirst, I view the tempting flood
That flies my touch, or thickens into mud,
Till thine own hand immerg'd the goblet dips,
And bears it streaming to my burning lips;
There borne aloft on Fancy's wing we fly,
Like souls embodied to their native sky;
Now ev'ry rock, each mountain, disappears,
And the round earth an even surface wears;
When lo! the force of some resistless weight
Bears me straight down from that pernicious height;
Parting, in vain our struggling arms we close;
Abhorred forms, dire phantoms interpose;
With trembling voice on thy lov'd name I call,
And gulphs yawn ready to receive my fall;
From these fallacious visions of distress
I wake; nor are my real sorrows less.
Thy absence, Delia! heightens every ill,
And gives e'en trivial pains the pow'r to kill.
Oh! wert thou near me; yet that wish forbear!
'Twere vain, my love—'twere vain to wish thee near;
Thy tender heart would heave with anguish too,
And by partaking but increase my woe.
Alone I'll grieve, till, gloomy sorrow past,
Health, like the cheerful day-spring, comes at last—
Comes fraught with bliss to banish ev'ry pain,
Hope, joy, and peace, and Delia in her train!