SONGS. Na drear-nighted December, The north cannot undo them With a sleety whistle through them; In a drear-nighted December, But with a sweet forgetting, Never, never petting About the frozen time. Ah! would 'twere so with many A gentle girl and boy! But were there ever any To know the change and feel it, HUSH, HUSH! 1 H I. USH, hush! Tread softly! hush, hush, my dear! All the house is asleep, but we know very well That the jealous, the jealous old bald-pate may hear, Tho' you've padded his night-cap Isabel! sweet Tho' your feet are more light than a Faery's feet, Who dances on bubbles where brooklets meet,— Hush, hush! soft tiptoe! hush, hush, my dear! For less than a nothing the jealous can hear. II. No leaf doth tremble, no ripple is there On the river, all's still, and the night's sleepy eye Closes up, and forgets all its Lethean care, Charm'd to death by the drone of the humming May-fly; And the moon, whether prudish or complaisant, Has fled to her bower, well knowing I want No light in the dusk, no torch in the gloom, But my Isabel's eyes and her lips pulp'd with bloom. III. Lift the latch! ah gently! ah tenderly - sweet! We are dead if that latchet gives one little clink! First printed in the "Literary Pocket-book and Com panion for the Lovers of Nature and Art," for 1818. Well done!-now those lips, and a flowery seatThe old man may sleep, and the planets may wink; The shut rose shall dream of our loves and awake Full-blown, and such warmth for the morning take, The stock-dove shall hatch his soft twin-eggs and coo, While I kiss to the melody, aching all through! 1818. S FAERY SONGS. I. HED no tear! oh shed no tear! The flower will bloom another year. Shed no tear. Overhead! look overhead! 'Mong the blossoms white and red- Adieu, adieu!-I fly, adieu! I vanish in the heaven's blue Adieu! Adieu! VOL. III. 33 II. PIRIT here that reignest! My forehead low, Enshaded with thy pinions! All passion-struck, Into thy pale dominions! Spirit here that laughest! Spirit here that quaffest! Spirit here that dancest! I join in the glee, While nudging the elbow of Momus! With a Bacchanal blush, Just fresh from the banquet of Comus! H III. H! woe is me! poor Silver-wing! These blossoms snow upon thy lady's pall! Such calm favonian burial! Go, pretty page! and soothly tell,The blossoms hang by a melting spell, And fall they must ere a star wink thrice Upon her closed eyes, That now in vain are weeping their last tears SONG OF FOUR FAIRIES. FIRE, AIR, EARTH, AND WATER, Salamander. HAPPY, happy glowing fire!us light I Zep. Fragrant air! delicious light! Dus. Let me to my glooms retire! |