You, eternal love for child, how did you fall into me,
Like a kind and gentle seed fallen on the desert floor,
That clinged to the other buds, waiting for a long, long while,
Guiding its juices in vain to the currents of the earth?

Of childhood I remember, before any other love,
That for parent, for sister, I felt so like the father
Of the child that was to come, of him who was within me,
A love of endless circle, from myself toward myself.

I would see him just as if he were a little brother,

Auspicious poet, wert thou not my friend,
How could I envy, what I must commend!
But since 'tis nature's law, in love and wit,
That youth should reign, and withering age submit,
With less regret those laurels I resign,
Which, dying on my brows, revive on thine.
With better grace an ancient chief may yield
The long contended honours of the field,
Than venture all his fortune at a cast,
And fight, like Hannibal, to lose at last.
Young princes, obstinate to win the prize,
Though yearly beaten, yearly yet they rise:

My Muse in meads has spent her many hours
Sitting, and sorting several sorts of flowers,
To make for others garlands; and to set
On many a head here, many a coronet.
But amongst all encircled here, not one
Gave her a day of coronation;
Till you, sweet mistress, came and interwove
A laurel for her, ever young as Love.
You first of all crown'd her; she must, of due,
Render for that, a crown of life to you.

Of Love and Time say what would Fanny know?
That Time is precious, and that Love is sweet?
That both, the choicest blessings lent below,
With gay Sixteen in envied union meet?
Time without Love is tasteless, dull, and cold,
Love out of Time will fond and doting prove;
To bright sixteen are all their treasures told,
Love suits the Time, and Time then favours Love.
No longer then of matron brows inquire
For sprightly Love, or swiftly-wasting Time;
Look but at home, you have what you require,—

I DID not choose thee, dearest. It was Love
That made the choice, not I. Mine eyes were blind
As a rude shepherd's who to some lone grove
His offering brings and cares not at what shrine
He bends his knee. The gifts alone were mine;
The rest was Love's. He took me by the hand,
And fired the sacrifice, and poured the wine,
And spoke the words I might not understand.
   I was unwise in all but the dear chance
Which was my fortune, and the blind desire
Which led my foolish steps to Love's abode,

When I dream that you love me, you'll surely forgive;
Extend not your anger to sleep;
For in visions alone your affection can live,--
I rise, and it leaves me to weep.

Then, Morpheus! envelope my faculties fast,
Shed o'er me your languor benign;
Should the dream of to-night but resemble the last,
What rapture celestial is mine!

They tell us that slumber, the sister of death,
Mortality's emblem is given;
To fate how I long to resign my frail breath,
If this be a foretaste of heaven!

Ho, ye lovers, list to me;
Warning words have I for thee:
Give ye heed, hefore ye wed,
To this thing Sir Chaucer said:

"Love wol not be constrained by maistrie,
When maistrie cometh, the god of love anon
Beteth his winges, and farewel, he is gon."

Other poets knew as well,
And the same sad story tell,
Hark ye, heed ye, while ye may,
What the worldly Pope doth say:

"Love, free as air, at sight of human ties
Spreads his light wings and in a moment flies."

This, Sir Hudibras, brave knight,

To love this flesh,
its rivers and valleys,
its fruits,
ripe or rotting.

To be conscious,
to understand a toad’s agony
or delight.

To finger the pricks of a bush,
lick the blood of the world
with a warm tongue,
and comprehend a crow’s hunger.

To breathe the spring air
full of laughing and weeping,
like a sow thistle
or lazy lizard.

To endure
without any sense of time—
to wake, sleep, live and die
under the same sun, moon and stars,
eternal as a weed.

434

To love thee Year by Year—
May less appear
Than sacrifice, and cease—
However, dear,
Forever might be short, I thought to show—
And so I pieced it, with a flower, now.

TO MRS. MULSO.
I
On Stella's brow as lately envious Time
His crooked lines with iron pencil traced,
That brow, erewhile like ivory tablets smooth,
With Love's high trophies hung, and victories graced,
Digging him little caves in every cell,
And every dimple, once where Love was wont to dwell;
He spied the God: and wondered still to spy,
Who higher held his torch in Time's despite;
Nor seemed to care for aught that he could do.
Then sternly thus he sought him thence to' affright:
The sovereign boy entrenched in a smile,