A love beyond one's reach
is certainly ridiculous!

In bed behind
a young man
too tall for him!

Where are the bay-leaves, Thestylis, and the charms?
Fetch all; with fiery wood the caldron crown;
Let glamour win me back my false lord's heart!
Twelve days the wretch hath not come nigh to me,
Nor made enquiry if I die or live,
Nor clamored (oh unkindness!) at my door.
Sure his swift fancy wanders otherwhere,
The slave of Aphrodite and of Love.
I'm off to Timagetus' wrestling-school
At dawn, that I may see him and denounce
His doings; but I'll charm him now with charms.
So shine out fair, O moon! To thee I sing
My soft low song: to thee and Hecate

An Amorous Shepherd lov'd a charming Boy,
As fair as thought could frame, or wish enjoy;
Unlike his Soul, illnatur'd and unkind,
An Angell's body with a Fury's mind:
How great a God Love was, He scorn'd to know,
How sharp his arrows, and how strong his bow,
What rageing wounds he scatters here below.
In his address and talk fierce, rude, untame,
He gave no comfort to the Shepherd's flame:
No cherry Lips, no Rose his Cheeks did dye,
No pleasing Fire did sparkle in his Eye,
Where eager thoughts with fainting Vertue strove,

I hear your spade
Delving the soft wet garden-mould,
And listen half-afraid
Lest you should chance dig up again the old
Long-buried golden dream that died
The day you came upon us side by side—

Lest unaware
And only half-remembering
You suddenly lay bare
Your love of me that perished in the spring,
And only see among the stones
A huddle of unknown time-whitened bones:

And so forget the heart of golden flame
That died the night misunderstanding came.

Love-lighted to the end, she may have thought,
As in she passed, ‘When was I here before?’
And when the radiant faces, more and more,
With old-home smiles their eager welcome brought,
Amid the gentle din she must have sought
His voice familiar at some opening door,
Ware of no change, love-folded as of yore,
Nor dreaming what Death's miracle had wrought.

Happy such morrows to love-lighted days!
The Heaven to her as Earth with him had been,—
The Earth to him as Heaven, because, within,
Her memories still vision all his ways.

All summer she scattered the daisy leaves;
They only mocked her as they fell.
She said: “The daisy but deceives;
There is no virtue in its spell.
‘He loves me not,’ ‘he loves me well,’
One story no two daisies tell.”
Ah, foolish heart, which waits and grieves
Under the daisy's mocking spell!

But summer departed, and came again.
The daisies whitened every hill;
Her heart had lost its last year's pain,
Her heart of love had had its fill,
And held love's secrets at its will.
The daisies stood untouched and still,

Thou hast wounded the spirit that loved thee,
And cherished thine image for years,
Thou hast taught me at last to forget thee,
In secret, in silence, and tears,
As a young bird when left by its mother,
Its earliest pinions to try,
Round the nest will still lingering hover,
Ere its trembling wings to try.

Thus we're taught in this cold world to smother
Each feeling that once was so dear;
Like that young bird I'll seek to discover
A home of affection elsewhere.
Though this heart may still cling to thee fondly
And dream of sweet memories past,

To the Bearer. Hold, are you mad? you damn'd confounded Dog,
I am to rise, and speak the Epilogue.
To the Audience. I come, kind Gentlemen, strange news to tell ye
I am the Ghost of poor departed Nelly.
Sweet Ladies, be not frighted, I'le be civil,
I'm what I was, a little harmless Devil.
For after death, we Sprights, have just such Natures,
We had for all the World, when humane Creatures;
And therefore I that was an Actress here,
Play all my Tricks in Hell, a Goblin there.
Gallants, look to't, you say there are no Sprights;

Ah, how sweet it is to love!
Ah, how gay is young Desire!
And what pleasing pains we prove
When we first approach Love's fire!
Pains of love be sweeter far
Than all other pleasures are.

Sighs which are from lovers blown
Do but gently heave the heart:
Ev'n the tears they shed alone
Cure, like trickling balm, their smart:
Lovers, when they lose their breath,
Bleed away in easy death.

Love and Time with reverence use,
Treat them like a parting friend;
Nor the golden gifts refuse
Which in youth sincere they send:

Young Love found a Dial once in a dark shade
Where man ne'er had wandered nor sunbeam played;
“Why thus in darkness lie?” whispered young Love,
“Thou, whose gay hours in sunshine should move.”
“I ne'er,” said the Dial, “have seen the warm sun,
“So noonday and midnight to me, Love, are one.”

Then Love took the Dial away from the shade,
And placed her where Heaven's beam warmly played.
There she reclined, beneath Love's gazing eye,
While, marked all with sunshine, her hours flew by.
“Oh, how,” said the Dial, “can any fair maid