Classic Poem

Young Lesbia slept. Her glowing cheek
Was on her polish'd arm reposing,
And slumber closed those fatal eyes
Which keep so many eyes from closing.

For even Cupid, when fatigued
Of playing with his bow and arrows,
Will harmless furl his weary wings,
And nestle with his mother's sparrows.

Young Lesbia slept — and visions gay
Before her dreaming soul were glancing
Like sights that in the moonbeams show,
When fairies on the green are dancing.

And, first, amid a joyous throng
She seem'd to move in festive measure,
With many a courtly worshipper,
That waited on her queenly pleasure.

And then, by one of those strange turns
That witch the mind so when we're dreaming,
She was a planet in the sky,
And they were stars around her beaming.

Yet hardly had that lovely light
(To which one cannot here help kneeling)
Its radiance in the vault above
Been for a few short hours revealing,

When, like a blossom from the bough,
By some remorseless whirlwind riven,
Swiftly upon its lurid path
'Twas back to earth like lightning driven.

Yet, brightly still, though coldly, there
Those other stars were calmly shining,
As if they did not miss the rays
That were but now with theirs entwining.

And half with pique, and half with pain,
To be from that gay chorus parting,
Young Lesbia from her dream awoke
With swelling heart and teardrop starting.

INTERPRETATION .

Had she but thought of those below,
Who thus were left with breasts benighted,
Till Heaven dismiss'd that star to earth,
By which alone our hearts are lighted —

Or, had she recollected, when
Each virtue from the world departed,
How Hope, the dearest, came again,
And stay'd to cheer the lonely-hearted:

Sweet Lesbia could not thus have grieved
From that cold, dazzling throng to sever,
And yield her young warm heart again
To those that prize its worth for ever.