Yet, Lady, no--for song so rude as mine, Chase not the wonders of your art divine; Still, radiant eye, upon the canvas dwell; Still, magic finger, weave your potent spell; And, while I sing the animated smiles Of fairy nature in these sun-born isles, Oh, might the song awake some bright design, Inspire a touch, or prompt one happy line, Proud were my soul, to see its humble thought On painting's mirror so divinely caught; While wondering Genius, as he leaned to trace The faint conception kindling into grace, Might love my numbers for the spark they threw, And bless the lay that lent a charm to you.
Say, have you ne'er, in nightly vision, strayed To those pure isles of ever-blooming shade, Which bards of old, with kindly fancy, placed For happy spirits in the Atlantic waste? There listening, while, from earth, each breeze that came Brought echoes of their own undying fame, In eloquence of eye, and dreams of song, They charmed their lapse of nightless hours along:-- Nor yet in song, that mortal ear might suit, For every spirit was itself a lute, Where Virtue wakened, with elysian breeze, Pure tones of thought and mental harmonies.
Believe me, Lady, when the zephyrs bland Floated our bark to this enchanted land,-- These leafy isles upon the ocean thrown, Like studs of emerald o'er a silver zone,-- Not all the charm, that ethnic fancy gave To blessed arbors o'er the western wave, Could wake a dream, more soothing or sublime, Of bowers ethereal, and the Spirit's clime.
Bright rose the morning, every wave was still, When the first perfume of a cedar hill Sweetly awaked us, and, with smiling charms, The fairy harbor woo'd us to its arms.[3] Gently we stole, before the whispering wind, Through plaintain shades, that round, like awnings, twined And kist on either side the wanton sails, Breathing our welcome to these vernal vales; While, far reflected o'er the wave serene, Each wooded island shed so soft a green That the enamored keel, with whispering play, Through liquid herbage seemed to steal its way.
Never did weary bark more gladly glide, Or rest its anchor in a lovelier tide! Along the margin, many a shining dome, White as the palace of a Lapland gnome, Brightened the wave;--in every myrtle grove Secluded bashful, like a shrine of love, Some elfin mansion sparkled through the shade; And, while the foliage interposing played, Lending the scene an ever-changing grace, Fancy would love, in glimpses vague, to trace The flowery capital, the shaft, the porch,[4] And dream of temples, till her kindling torch Lighted me back to all the glorious days Of Attic genius; and I seemed to gaze On marble, from the rich Pentelio mount, Gracing the umbrage of some Naiad's fount.
