TO MARGUERITE, COUNTESS OF BLESSINGTON.
I pray thee, ladye, turn these leaves,
And gaze upon the face
Whose lineaments no artist’s skill
Methinks, could truly trace.
The outline knows art’s fine control,
There are no colours for the soul.
And thou wert his familiar friend,*
Whose kindness and whose care
Bore with, and tenderly would soothe,
The mood it could not share.
Ah! all who feel that poet’s powers,
Should thank thee for his pleasant hours.
If I can read that face aright,
’Tis something more than fair:
Ah! not alone the lovely face,
The lovely heart is there.
The smile that seems to light and win,
Speaks of the deeper world within.
Amid Ravenna’s purple woods,
Purple with day’s decline,
When the sweet evening winds around
Were murmuring in the pine—
Did that dark spirit yield to thee
The trouble of its melody.
How gentle and how womanly
Thy soft mind must have reigned,
Before it could have won from him
The confidence it gained!
For chords like his, so finely strung,
With but a single touch are wrung.
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