SONNET L.

2nd Oct. 1807.

WHETHER thou smile or frown, thou beauteous

face,

Thy charms alike possess my throbbing heart, Nor canst thou gesture, look, or word impart Fraught not with magic of enchanting grace: Oh, could I once thy lovely form embrace!

Die on thy lips, and, as fierce raptures dart, Breathe sighs that bid the mutual soul depart! And with keen glances, keener glances chase! It may not be, Oh Love!-Thou gavest to me A heart too prone thy raptures to adore!

The touch, the look, the sigh, are mine no more! Love is departed, and in agony

The infatuated spirit must deplore

That after love no other joy can be.

SONNET LI.

TO MISS

Oct. 4, 1807.

OH sentiment, in thy immortal glow,

Our daily life with aspect new is seen, Thine is the touch discriminating, keen! In persons, things, thou various shades dost

know

Which to mere intellect could not bestow

A self-amusing topic: blank, I ween, Save to the initiate mind, thy busiest scene, Filled with affections, fears, and joy, and woe. But, ah! how seldom must the trembling

sense,

By thee inspir'd, a heart responsive find!

How many to thy favours make pretence! But rarely art thou, bashful instinct, kind, Where Modesty with virgin influence

Hides not, with jealous care, her stores of mind!

SONNET LII.

TO MISS

Oct. 4, 1807.

ONCE more, oh sentiment, I strike my lyre,
Thy powers to sing.-To all the stores of art
Thou dost entrancing dignity impart!
To painting, music, poesy, thy fire

Doth give a fascinating influence:

Forms, sounds, and words, subordinate to thee, Rise to a more imperious agency,

Ineffable in grace and eloquence.

Come not with death, oh sentiment! nor come With disappointment, sorrow, and disease! Then dim the impassioned eye, the tongue is dumb

Where fascination played her witcheries. Then heaviest ills the loftiest bosom numb, Since streams most copious on that bosom freeze.

:

SONNET LIII.

To her who will understand this, and the two

preceding ones.

4th Oct. 1807.

To her I bring these trophies of thy reign,
Oh sentiment! thy most beloved child!
Soft is her look, as if an angel smiled;
And musical her voice, as when the strain
Of shepherd's flute along the twilight plain
Is heard from far; her step is calm and mild :
Pride, and persuasive grace, seem reconciled
In her, to consummate what poets feign.

To thee I bring these trophies, beauteous form!

Round whom taste, elegance, and fancy breathe,

To fashion's courtly ease you add the charm, To deem no thing that hath a heart beneath Solicitous benignity!-Hence, warm

With partial thoughts, I twine the unworthy

wreathe.

SONNET LIV.

Written after a Walk by Rydal Water, Westmoreland, in time of War.

7th Oct. 1807.

In such a day how calm and mild this scene, Made for poetic thought. The woods display'd Of brown and yellow every varying shade: And here and there the fresh and lingering green Told yet of summer and her days serene,

Too soon departed! Fading fern array'd The russet hills; and, as faint sun-gleams stray'd,

In warmer hues th' upland slopes were seen. Oh, beauteous aspect of a beauteous world! Mournful to think how little understood!

In man's distemper'd heart hath frenzy hurl'd Envenom'd shafts! The sword, defil'd with blood, Lays waste the earth and o'er the ocean flood The crimson flag of discord is unfurl'd.