Gentle love, this hour befriend me,
To my eyes resign thy dart;
Notes of melting music lend me,
To dissolve a frozen heart.
Chill as mountain snow her bosom,
Though I tender language use,
'Tis by cold indifference frozen,
To my arms, and to my Muse.
See! my dying eyes are pleading,
Where a breaking heart appears;
For thy pity interceding
With the eloquence of tears.
While the lamp of life is fading,
And beneath thy coldness dies,
Death my ebbing pulse invading,
Take my soul into thy eyes.
—Aaron Hill
Love's Likeness
O mark yon Rose-tree! When the West
Breathes on her with too warm a zest,
She turns her cheek away;
Yet if one moment he refrain,
She turns her cheek to him again,
And woos him still to stay!
Is she not like a maiden coy
Press'd by some amorous-breathing boy?
Tho' coy, she courts him too,
Winding away her slender form,
She will not have him woo so warm,
And yet will have him woo!
—George Darley