Classic Poem

BURDEN OF FAIR WOMEN

In such a star I saw two bright eyes turning,
With so much worth and sweetness over-brimming,
That soon before those wells of Love my yearning
And tired heart could bear no lesser hymning:
None matched her, none in times and places dimming,
Of any for whose beauty men went burning;
Not even she whose lustre left Troy swimming
In blood and shattered Greece with her returning.
Nor yet the radiant Roman who, with dagger
Drinking her pure and outraged bosom, banished
Pollution worse than death: such charms should stagger
Beneath their own rich burden till they vanished,
Shedding on me delight, on Nature glory —
Ah! Laura, latest, loveliest, bitterest story!