The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) eBook

Theodore Watts-Dunton
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 352 pages of information about The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753).

The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) eBook

Theodore Watts-Dunton
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 352 pages of information about The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753).
my deserted arms. 
  Long did she struggle, long the war maintain,
  But all th’ efforts of life, alas! were vain. 
  Could art have saved her, she had still been
  mine,
  Both art and care together did combine: 
  But what is proof against the will divine? 
  Methinks I still her dying conflict view,
  And the sad sight does all my grief renew;
  Rack’d by convulsive pains, she meekly lies,
  And gazes on me with imploring eyes;
  With eyes which beg relief, but all in vain,
  I see but cannot, cannot ease her pain. 
  She must the burden unassisted bear,
  I cannot with her in her tortures share: 
  Would they were mine, and me flood easy by;
  For what one loves, sure ’twere not hard to die. 
  See how me labours, how me pants for breath,
  She’s lovely still, she’s sweet, she’s sweet in
  death! 
  Pale as she is, me beauteous does remain,
  Her closing eyes their lustre still retain: 
  Like setting suns with undiminish’d light,
  They hide themselves within the verge of night. 
  She’s gone, she’s gone, she sigh’d her soul away! 
  And can I, can I any longer stay? 
  My life alas has ever tiresome been,
  And I few happy easy days have seen;
  But now it does a greater burden grow,
  I’ll throw it off, and no more sorrow know,
  But with her to calm peaceful regions go. 
  Stay, thou dear innocence, retard thy flight,
  O stop thy journey to the realms of light;
  Stay ’till I come:  to thee I’ll swiftly move,
  Attracted by the strongest passion, love.

Lucinda.

  No more, no more let me such language hear,
  I can’t, I can’t the piercing accents bear: 
  Each word you utter stabs me to the heart,
  I could from life, not from Marissa part: 
  And were your tenderness as great as mine,
  While I were left, you would net thus repine. 
  My friends are riches, health, and all to me;
  And while they’re mine I cannot wretched be.

Marissa.

  If I on you could happiness bestow,
  I still the toils of life would undergo,
  Would still contentedly my lot sustain,
  And never more of my hard fate complain: 
  But since my life to you will useless prove,
  O let me hasten to the joys above: 
  Farewel, farewel, take, take my last adieu,
  May Heaven be more propitious still to you,
  May you live happy when I’m in my grave,
  And no misfortunes, no afflictions have: 
  If to sad objects you’ll some pity lend
  And give a sigh to an unhappy friend,
  Think of Marissa, and her wretched state,
  How’s she’s been us’d by her malicious fate;
  Recount those storms which she has long sustain’d,
  And then rejoice that she the part has gain’d;
  The welcome haven of eternal rest,
  Where she shall be for ever, ever bless’d;
  And in her mother’s, and her daughter’s

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The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.