With a slow, languid, long-refining tongue;
Puzzle for days on one particular stare,
Or if you knew a word’s peculiar force,
Or what you looked like when you were quite young.
You’d lift me heaven-high—till a word grated.
Dash me hell-deep—oh that luxurious Pit,
Fatly and well encushioned with self-pity,
Where Love’s an epicure not quickly sated!
What mournful musics wander over it,
Faint-blown from some long-lost celestial city!