3 The early gales knocked gently at the door
Of every flower, to bid the odours wake;
Which, catching in their softest arms, they bore
From bed to bed, and so returned them back
To their own lodgings, doubled by the blisses
They sipped from their delicious brethren's kisses.
4 Upon the wings of those enamouring breaths
Refreshment, vigour, nimbleness attended;
Which, wheresoe'er they flew, cheered up their paths,
And with fresh airs of life all things befriended:
For Heaven's sweet Spirit deigned his breath to join
And make the powers of these blasts divine.
5 The goodly trees' bent arms their nobler load
Of fruit which blest oppression overbore:
That orchard where the dragon warder stood,
For all its golden boughs, to this was poor,
To this, in which the greater serpent lay,
Though not to guard the trees, but to betray.
6 Of fortitude there rose a stately row;
Here, of munificence a thickset grove;
There, of wise industry a quickset grew;
Here, flourished a dainty copse of love;
There, sprang up pleasant twigs of ready wit;
Here, larger trees of gravity were set,
7 Here, temperance; and wide-spread justice there,
Under whose sheltering shadow piety,
Devotion, mildness, friendship planted were;
Next stood renown with head exalted high;
Then twined together plenty, fatness, peace.
O blessed place, where grew such things as these!
EVE.
1 Her spacious, polished forehead was the fair
And lovely plain where gentle majesty
Walked in delicious state: her temples clear
Pomegranate fragments, which rejoiced to lie
In dainty ambush, and peep through their cover
Of amber-locks whose volume curled over.
2 The fuller stream of her luxuriant hair
Poured down itself upon her ivory back:
In which soft flood ten thousand graces were
Sporting and dallying with every lock;
The rival winds for kisses fell to fight,
And raised a ruffling tempest of delight.
3 Two princely arches, of most equal measures,
Held up the canopy above her eyes,
And opened to the heavens far richer treasures,
Than with their stars or sun e'er learn'd to rise:
Those beams can ravish but the body's sight,
These dazzle stoutest souls with mystic light.
4 Two garrisons were these of conquering love;
Two founts of life, of spirit, of joy, of grace;
Two easts in one fair heaven, no more above,
But in the hemisphere of her own face;
Two thrones of gallantry; two shops of miracles;
Two shrines of deities; two silent oracles.