“WHERE wert thou, Misho! yesterday?” ‘O ’twas a happy day to me! A lovely maiden cross’d my way, A maiden smiling lovelily. And those sweet smiles for me were meant; I claimed her—mother answer’d ‘No!’ Would steal her—vain was the intent, For many guardians watch’d her so. There grows a verdant almond-tree Before her house—its boughs I’ll climb; Wail like a cuckoo mournfully, And swallow-like, at evening time, Pour forth my woe in throbbings deep, And like a sorrowing widow sigh, And like a youthful maiden weep. So may her mother turn her eye, Pitying my grief, her heart may move, And she may give me her I love.’
I WISH the happy time were nigh, When youths are sold, that I might buy. But for an azure-eyed _Milinar_, { 219} I would not give a single dinar, Though for a raven-black eyed youth, A thousand golden coins, in truth. Alas! alas!—and is it true? My own fair youth has eyes of blue; Yes! they are blue—yet dear to me— Will he forgive my levity? Ye maidens! pray him to forgive me; Nay! spare me now—and rather leave me To tell him “I am yours”—and smile In fond affection all the while.
ROSE! O smile upon the youth no longer; He, in his impatience to be wedded, Chose a widow for his years unsuited, And where’er she goes, where’er she tarries, She is mourning for her ancient husband.
“O my husband! first and best possession! Happy were the days we spent together! Early we retired and late we waken’d. Thou didst wake me kissing my white forehead, ‘Up, my heart! the sun is high in heaven, And our aged mother is arisen.’”
FAIREST youths are here—but not the fairest! Could I hear him now, or could I see him,— Could I know if he be sick, or faithless! Were he sick, my ears would rather hear it, Than that he had loved another maiden. Sickness may depart, and time restore him,— If enamour’d,—never! never! never!
O! if I were a mountain streamlet, I know where I would flow; I’d spring into the crystal Sava, Where the gay vessels go, That I might look upon my lover— For fain my heart would know If, when he holds the helm, he ever Looks on my rose, and thinks Of her who gave it;—if the nosegay I made of sweetest pinks Is faded yet, and if he wear it. On Saturday I cull To give him for a Sabbath present All that is beautiful.