Classic Poem

Ah well away! for me the sun in vain
With fluid gold illumes the azure sky;
Dead is my soul to Clio's god-like strain,
To music's voice, and beauty's cheering eye:
Death hovers round — his raven ensigns fly.
Ah! what avails imagination's glow,
The pictur'd landscape, ting'd with brightest dye?
The ruthless tyrant aims his certain blow,
And lays the castled pile of fancy low.
Oh! swift transport me to some milder clime,
Where friendly suns a genial warmth bestow;
There wait the slow, the sure approach of time,
And languish out, estrang'd from hopes or fears,
The sickly remnant of declining years.