LINES ON A MINIATURE. It is her image!-Even as She stands before me yet, Mirrored in Memory's faithful glassWhen last mine eye she met : The sweet expression of that face, The sadness of that brow, So like so true—that as I gaze I seem to see her now! 'Tis like, though silent-how unlike! I gaze upon it, till I almost fancy speech it hath That image, calm and still: I breathe to it, in softest tone, A thousand kisses on that cheek, And yet, though kisses back, the while, They seem to wear her well-known smile Which bade me kiss again! Oh! wondrous power of mighty art! Whose magic can restore Their forms, when those we love depart, To sight and sense once more: And thou, fair type of her, whose charms Thou dost so well recall, We part not, till is in these arms, Thy dear ORIGINAL! RETURNING LETTERS. I SEND thee back each gift and token There was a time, I had not parted With the most trifling gift of thine; But now, with hope, the broken-hearted May well all other gifts resign! I send thee back each letter-glowing If all the wealth by kings e'er chartered, And even while I thus return them So dear was once each line to me, There was a time, I thought that, never I send back all!-Ay! every token I ask but this:-Since with thee, stronger I would not that a single line Should speak of hopes forever blighted; I would not that one vow of mine Were left to say by thee 'twas slighted! And now, since we at last must part, Kindly I bid thee thus-Farewell! And oh that I could learn the art, Fabled, of yore, in Lethe's spell!— That I could all the past forget! But no! For though we meet not still As in the days gone by we've met— I still must love thee, and I will! TO A COQUETTE. "Thou'rt false to me! Thou'rt false to me! And pride shall teach me to forget!" Ay! thou art false !- -as false and fair Should only seek to please the eye: Around the Dead Sea's arid waste; Which to the sight are fair as thou, Yet dust and ashes to the taste! |