MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.

STANZAS

WRITTEN IN THE FIRST LEAF OF LILLIAN.

TALK not to me of learned dust,

Of reasoning and renown,

Of withering wreath and crumbling bust,
Torn book and tattered gown;

Oh, Wisdom lives in Folly's ring,

And beards, thank Heaven, are not the thing!

Then let me live a long romance,

And learn to trifle well;

And write my motto, "Vive la danse,"

And "Vive la bagatelle !"

And give all honor, as is fit,

To sparkling eyes, and sparkling wit.

And let me deem, when Sophs condemn
And Seniors burn my lays,

That some bright eyes will smile on them,
And some kind hearts will praise;

And thus my little book shall be
A mine of pleasant thoughts to me.

And we, perchance, may meet no more;

For other accents sound

And darker prospects spread before,
And colder hearts come round;
And cloistered walk and grated pane
Must wear their wonted gloom again.

But those who meet, as we have met,
In frolic and in laughter,—
O, dream not they can e'er forget

The thoughts that linger after;
That parted friend and faded scene
Can be as if they ne'er had been.

No! I shall miss that merry smile
When thou hast left me lone;

And listen in the silent aisle

For that remembered tone;

And look up to the lattice high

For beckoning hand and beaming eye.

And thou, perhaps, when years are gone,

Wilt turn these pages over,
And waste one idle thought upon

A rambling, rhyming rover,

And deem the Poet and his line

Both wild, both worthless,-and both thine!

(TRIN. COLL., CAMBRIDGE,

July 8, 1823.)

STANZAS

WRITTEN IN A COPY OF LILLIAN, SENT TO A LADY

IN EXCHANGE FOR TWO DRAWINGS ILLUSTRATIVE

OF THE POEM.

THE gifts the Rhymer begs to-day

Shall long be dear to him,

When Passion's glow shall pass away,

And Fancy's light grow dim,

And naught remain of boyhood's schemes,
But Sorrow's tears, and Memory's dreams.

Yes, dear the gifts shall ever be ;
For Humor there hath flung

A spell of magic witchery

On all he thought and sung,

And blended in a living dance
The creatures of his own romance.

E'en he might shudder at the sight
Of his own monster's feast;
E'en he might feel a sweet affright,
As, ruling the rude beast,

His own fair damsel skims the sea
In all her headless ecstasy.