With the uncertain hues, that beauty gives,

Even admiration, swerving various ways,

Imagines change, and otherwhere straight lives:

The ficklest thing beneath the inconstant moon

Is the sigh swelling from a lover’s breast;

It pants, nor thinks that it must die full soon,

Even by its own luxuriance opprest.

Love like an o’erstrung bow, now snaps and breaks,

And now, o’erwrought, relaxes, yields, and shakes.

{33}

{33}

XXXIII.

I ask’d the echoes, that recall the past,

I ask’d the thrilling voice of those who live,

I ask’d the forms that mother nature cast

And feeds within the mind, aye yet can give,

Must love be fostered by its own despair?

Must the mere shadow mark where we adored?

Must we be drunk even with the wanton air,

Because both breathe it;—and our hearts be gored?

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