O give me, from this heartless scene released, Or lies the purple evening on the bay Unheard, unseen, behind the alder-trees On whose trim seat doth Edmund stretch at ease, And while the lazy boat sways to and fro, Breathes in his flute sad airs, so wild and slow, That his own cheek is wet with quiet tears. But O, dear Anne! when midnight wind careers, And the gust pelting on the out-house shed Makes the cock shrilly on the rain-storm crow, To hear thee sing some ballad full of woe, Ballad of ship-wrecked sailor floating dead, Whom his own true-love buried in the sands! Thee, gentle woman, for thy voice remeasures Whatever tones and melancholy pleasures The Things of Nature utter; birds or trees Or moan of ocean-gale in weedy caves, Or where the stiff grass mid the heath-plant waves, Murmur and music thin of sudden breeze. THE KEEP-SAKE. THE tedded hay, the first fruits of the soil, That blue and bright-eyed floweret of the brook, * One of the names and (meriting to be the only one) of the Myosotis Scorpioides Palustris, a flower from six to twelve inches 1 So will not fade the flowers which Emmeline With delicate fingers on the snow-white silk Has worked, (the flowers which most she knew I loved,) And, more beloved than they, her auburn hair. In the cool morning twilight, early waked By her full bosom's joyless restlessness, Softly she rose, and lightly stole along, Down the slope coppice to the woodbine bower, Whose rich flowers, swinging in the morning breeze, Over their dim fast-moving shadows hung, Making a quiet image of disquiet In the smooth, scarcely moving river-pool. There, in that bower where first she owned her love, From off her glowing cheek, she sate and stretched high, with blue blossom and bright yellow eye. It has the same name over the whole Empire of Germany (Virgissmein nicht) and we believe, in Denmark and Sweden. |