Classic Poem

WHEREIN HE HOPES HE MAY DIE BEFORE LAURA

The gentle wind that with its delicate sigh
Flutters green laurel, flutters golden tresses,
Persuades with its infrequent suave caresses
The gazer's spirit from the flesh to fly.
A sweet and snow-white rose in thorns set high!
Where in the world match her whose grace surpasses
Eve's own? The glory of our age confesses
No equal! O let Laura never die!
Let me die first, so the large public theft
Escape me, the blind earth to darkness left,
And these eyes desolated and bereft,
My mind in which no other thoughts are heard,
Mine ears which by no other sound are stirred
Save by the pure perfection of her word!