Skip to main content

The Bliss of Absence

Drink , oh youth, joy's purest ray
From thy loved one's eyes all day,
And her image paint at night!
Better rule no lover knows,
Yet true rapture greater grows,
When far sever'd from her sight.

Powers eternal, distance, time,
Like the might of stars sublime,
Gently rock the blood to rest.
O'er my senses softness steals,
Yet my bosom lighter feels,
And I daily am more blest.

Though I can forget her ne'er,
Yet my mind is free from care,
I can calmly live and move;
Unperceived infatuation

A la Sombra de Mis Cabellos

MY love lay there,
In the shadow of my hair,
As my glossy raven tresses downward flow;
And dark as midnight's cloud,
They fell o'er him like a shroud:
Ah! does he now remember it or no?

With a comb of gold each night
I combed my tresses bright;
But the sportive zephyr tossed them to and fro;
So I pressed them in a heap,
For my love whereon to sleep:
Ah! does he now remember it or no?

He said he loved to gaze
On my tresses' flowing maze,
And the midnight of my dark Moorish eyes;

Tristan and Isolde

THE LOVE SIN .

None , unless the saints above,
Knew the secret of their love;
For with calm and stately grace
Isolde held ber queenly place,
Tho' the courtiers' hundred eyes
Sought the lovers to surprise.
Or to read the mysteries
Of a love — so rumour said —
By a magic philtre fed
Which for ever in their veins
Burn'd with love's consuming pains.

Yet their hands would twine unseen,
In a clasp 'twere hard to sever;

Instability

FROM THE SPANISH. — SIXTEENTH CENTURY

When the day is brightest,
Darkness draweth near;
When the heart is lightest,
Coming grief I fear.

Eyes of heavenly splendour,
Radiance o'er me fling;
But when their light's most tender
I fear its vanishing.

Lips, where passion keepeth
Holiest incense, bend to mine;
But when woman speaketh,