Wherefore that faint smile of thine, Some honey-converse feeds thy mind, In love with thee forgets to close His curtains, wasting odorous sighs All night long on darkness blind. What aileth thee? whom waitest thou With thy softened, shadowed brow, And those dew-lit eyes of thine, Thou faint smiler, Adeline? Lovest thou the doleful wind When thou gazest at the skies? Doth the low-tongued Orient Wander from the side o' the morn, On thy pillow, lowly bent With melodious airs lovelorn, Breathing light against thy face, Round thy neck in subtle ring Make a carcanet of rays And ye talk together still, In the language wherewith Spring Hence that look and smile of thine, A CHARACTER. I. WITH a half-glance upon the sky II. He spake of beauty: that the dull Life in dead stones, or spirit in air; Then looking as 't were in a glass, He smoothed his chin and sleeked his 1 And said the earth was beautiful. III. He spake of virtue: not the gods More purely, when they wish to charm Pallas and Juno sitting by: And with a sweeping of the arm, And a lack-lustre dead-blue eye, IV. Most delicately hour by hour In impotence of fancied power. v. With lips depressed as he were meek, Himself unto himself he sold: Upon himself himself did feed: Quiet, dispassionate, and cold, And other than his form of creed, With chiselled features clear and sleek. THE POET. THE poet in a golden clime was born, With golden stars above; Dowered with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn, The love of love. He saw through life and death, through good and il He saw through his own soul. The marvel of the everlasting will, An open scroll, Before him lay with echoing feet he threaded : The secret'st walks of fame: The viewless arrows of his thoughts were headed And winged with flame, |