But other times and other feelings came:
Hope is love's element, and love with her
Sickened of its own vanity . . . . She lived
Mid bright realities and brighter dreams,
Those strange but exquisite imaginings
That tinge with such sweet colours minstrel thoughts;
And fame, like sunlight, was upon her path;
And strangers heard her name, and eyes that never
Had looked on Sappho, yet had wept with her.
Her first love never wholly lost its power,
But, like rich incense shed, although no trace
Was of its visible presence, yet its sweetness
Mingled with every feeling, and it gave
That soft and melancholy tenderness
Which was the magic of her song . . . . That Youth
Who knelt before her was so like the shape
That haunted her spring dreams—the same dark eyes,
