Selected Poems (21 page)

In softness as in firmness far above

Remoter females, famed for sickening prate;

Her mind is nobler sure, her charms perchance as great.

LVIII

The seal Love’s dimpling finger hath impress’d

595

Denotes how soft that chin which bears his touch:
²

Her lips, whose kisses pout to leave their nest,

Bid man be valiant ere he merit such:

Her glance how wildly beautiful! how much

Hath Phœbus woo’d in vain to spoil her cheek,

600

Which glows yet smoother from his amorous clutch!

Who round the North for paler dames would seek?

How poor their forms appear! how languid, wan, and weak!

LIX

Match me, ye climes! which poets love to laud;

Match me, ye harams of the land! where now1

605

I strike my strain, far distant, to applaud

Beauties that ev’n a cynic must avow;

Match me those Houries, whom ye scarce allow

To taste the gale lest Love should ride the wind,

With Spain’s dark-glancing daughters – deign to know,

610

There your wise Prophet’s paradise we find,

His black-eyed maids of Heaven, angelically kind.

LX

Oh, thou Parnassus!2 whom I now survey,

Not in the phrensy of a dreamer’s eye,

Not in the fabled landscape of a lay,

615

But soaring snow-clad through thy native sky,

In the wild pomp of mountain majesty!

What marvel if I thus essay to sing?

The humblest of thy pilgrims passing by

Would gladly woo thine Echoes with his string,

620

Though from thy heights no more one Muse will wave her wing.

LXI

Oft have I dream’d of Thee! whose glorious name

Who knows not, knows not man’s divinest lore:

And now I view thee, ’tis, alas! with shame

That I in feeblest accents must adore.

625

When I recount thy worshippers of yore

I tremble and can only bend the knee;

Nor raise my voice, nor vainly dare to soar,

But gaze beneath thy cloudy canopy

In silent joy to think at last I look on Thee!

LXII

630

Happier in this than mightiest bards have been,

Whose fate to distant homes confined their lot,

Shall I unmoved behold the hallow’d scene,

Which others rave of, though they know it not?

Though here no more Apollo haunts his grot,

635

And thou, the Muses‘ seat, art now their grave,

Some gentle spirit still pervades the spot,

Sighs in the gale, keeps silence in the cave,

And glides with glassy foot o’er yon melodious wave.

LXIII

Of thee hereafter. – Ev’n amidst my strain

640

I turn’d aside to pay my homage here;

Forgot the land, the sons, the maids of Spain;

Her fate, to every freeborn bosom dear;

And hail’d thee, not perchance without a tear.

Now to my theme – but from thy holy haunt

645

Let me some remnant, some memorial bear;

Yield me one leaf of Daphne’s deathless plant,

Nor let thy votary’s hope be deem’d an idle vaunt.

LXIV

But ne’er didst thou, fair Mount! when Greece was oun

See round thy giant base a brighter choir,

650

Nor e’er did Delphi, when her priestess sung

The Pythian hymn with more than mortal fire,

Behold a train more fitting to inspire

The song of love than Andalusia’s maids,

Nurst in the glowing lap of soft desire:

655

Ah! that to these were given such peaceful shades

As Greece can still bestow, though Glory fly her glades.

LXV

Fair is proud Seville; let her country boast

Her strength, her wealth, her site of ancient days;
¹

But Cadiz, rising on the distant coast,

660

Calls forth a sweeter, though ignoble praise.

Ah, Vice! how soft are thy voluptuous ways!

While boyish blood is mantling, who can ’scape

The fascination of thy magic gaze?

A Cherub-hydra round us dost thou gape,

665

And mould to every taste thy dear delusive shape.

LXVI

When Paphos fell by time – accursed Time!

The Queen who conquers all must yield to thee –

The Pleasures fled, but sought as warm a clime;

And Venus, constant to her native sea,

670

To nought else constant, hither deign’d to flee;

And fix’d her shrine within these walls of white;

Though not to one dome circumscribeth she

Her worship, but, devoted to her rite,

A thousand altars rise, for ever blazing bright.

LXVII

675

From morn till night, from night till startled Morn

Peeps blushing on the revel’s laughing crew,

The song is heard, the rosy garland worn;

Devices quaint, and frolics ever new,

Tread on each other’s kibes. A long adieu

680

He bids to sober joy that here sojourns:

Nought interrupts the riot, though in lieu

Of true devotion monkish incense burns,

And love and prayer unite, or rule the hour by turns.

LXVIII

The Sabbath comes, a day of blessed rest;

685

What hallows it upon this Christian shore?

Lo! it is sacred to a solemn feast;

Hark! heard you not the forest-monarch’s roar?

Crashing the lance, he snuffs the spouting gore

Of man and steed, o’erthrown beneath his horn;

690

The throng’d arena shakes with shouts for more;

Yells the mad crowd o’er entrails freshly torn,

Nor shrinks the female eye, nor ev’n affects to mourn.

LXIX

The seventh day this; the jubilee of man.

London! right well thou know’st the day of prayer:

695

Then thy spruce citizen, wash’d artisan,

And smug apprentice gulp their weekly air:

Thy coach of hackney, whiskey, one-horse chair,

And humblest gig through sundry suburbs whirl;

To Hampstead, Brentford, Harrow make repair;

700

Till the tired jade the wheel forgets to hurl,

Provoking envious gibe from each pedestrian churl.

LXX

Some o’er thy Thamis row the ribbon’d fair,

Others along the safer turnpike fly;

Some Richmond-hill ascend some scud to Ware

705

And many to the steep of Highgate hie.

Ask ye, Boeotian shades! the reason why?
¹

‘Tis to the worship of the solemn Horn,

Grasp’d in the holy hand of Mystery,

In whose dread name both men and maids are sworn,

710

And consecrate the oath with draught, and dance till morn.

LXXI

All have their fooleries – not alike are thine,

Fair Cadiz, rising o’er the dark blue sea!

Soon as the matin bell proclaimeth nine,

Thy saint adorers count the rosary:

715

Much is the VIRGIN teased to shrive them free

(Well do I ween the only virgin there)

From crimes as numerous as her beadsmen be;

Then to the crowded circus forth they fare:

Young, old, high, low, at once the same diversion share.

LXXII

720

The lists are oped, the spacious area clear’d,

Thousands on thousands piled are seated round;

Long ere the first loud trumpet’s note is heard,

Ne vacant space for lated wight is found:

Here dons, grandees, but chiefly dames abound,

725

Skill’d in the ogle of a roguish eye,

Yet ever well inclined to heal the wound;

None through their cold disdain are doom’d to die

As moon-struck bards complain, by Love’s sad archery.

LXXIII

Hush’d is the din of tongues – on gallant steeds,

730

With milk-white crest, gold spur, and light-pois’d lance

Four cavaliers prepare for venturous deeds,

And lowly bending to the lists advance;

Rich are their scarfs, their charges featly prance:

If in the dangerous game they shine to-day,

735

The crowd’s loud shout and ladies’ lovely glance,