HELEN
XXVI
High-born Helen, round your dwelling
These twenty years I’ve paced in vain;
Haughty beauty, thy lover’s duty
Hath been to glory in his pain.
High-born Helen, proudly telling
Stories of thy cold disdain;
I starve, I die, now you comply,
And I no longer can complain.
These twenty years I’ve lived on tears,
Dwelling for ever on a frown;
On sighs I’ve fed, your scorn my bread;
I perish now you kind are grown.
Can I, who loved my beloved,
But for the scorn “was in her eye,”
Can I be moved for my beloved
When she “returns me sigh for sigh?”
In stately pride, by my bedside,
High-born Helen’s portrait’s hung;
Deaf to my praise, my mournful lays
Are nightly to the portrait sung.
To that I weep, nor ever sleep,
Complaining all night long to her:
Helen, grown old, no longer cold,
Said, “You to all men I prefer.”
THE
BEGGAR MAN
XXVII
Abject, stooping, old, and wan,
See yon wretched beggar man;
Once a father’s hopeful heir,
Once a mother’s tender care.
When too young to understand,
He but scorch’d his little hand
By the candle’s flaming light
Attracted, dancing, spiral, bright;
Clasping fond her darling round,
A thousand kisses heal’d the wound:
Now, abject, stooping, old, and wan,
No mother tends the beggar man.
The Beggar Man
Then nought too good for him to wear,
With cherub face and flaxen hair,
In fancy’s choicest gauds array’d,
Cap of lace with rose to aid;
Milk-white hat and feather blue;
Shoes of red; and coral too;
With silver bells to please his ear,
And charm the frequent ready tear.
Now, abject, stooping, old, and wan,
Neglected is the beggar man.
See the boy advance in age,
And learning spreads her useful page;
In vain—for giddy pleasure calls,
And shows the marbles, tops, and balls.
What’s learning to the charms of play?
Th’ indulgent tutor must give way.
A heedless wilful dunce, and wild,
The parents’ fondness spoil’d the child;
The youth in vagrant courses ran.
Now, abject, stooping, old, and wan,
Their fondling is the beggar man.
