Classic Poem

O thou, who seek'st in vain by looks of scorn
To check the love that in my bosom first,
Of thine own beauty, and my daring born,
By absence and despair is only nurst;
Know that my heart would rather bear the worst,
If worse there be, than that already borne,
And loving, perish of its own fond thirst,
Than have thine image from its memory torn.
Cease Lady! then, to hope I can forget,
Long as I breathe, to love and think of thee,
Thy rigor can but hasten nature's debt;
Nor say I this to move thy sympathy,
Knowing thy cold disdain on triumph set
Makes thee, fair Savage, pitiless to me!