Brave, suffering souls! they little knew How many a tear their injuries drew From one meek maid, one gentle foe, Whom love first touch’d with others’ woe— Whose life, as free from thought as sin, Slept like a lake, till Love threw in His talisman, and woke the tide, And spread its trembling circles wide. Once, EMIR! thy unheeding child, ’Mid all this havoc, bloom’d and smil’d,— Tranquil as on some battle plain The Persian lily shines and towers,[260] Before the combat’s reddening stain Hath fall’n upon her golden flowers. Light-hearted maid, unaw’d, unmov’d, While Heaven but spar’d the sire she lov’d, Once at thy evening tales of blood Unlistening and aloof she stood— And oft, when thou hast pac’d along Thy Haram halls with furious heat, Hast thou not curs’d her cheerful song, That came across thee, calm and sweet, Like lutes of angels, touch’d so near Hell’s confines, that the damn’d can hear! Far other feelings Love hath brought— Her soul all flame, her brow all sadness, She now has but the one dear thought, And thinks that o’er, almost to madness! Oft doth her sinking heart recall His words—“For _my_ sake weep for all;” And bitterly, as day on day Of rebel carnage fast succeeds, She weeps a lover snatch’d away In every Gheber wretch that bleeds. There’s not a sabre meets her eye, But with his life-blood seems to swim; There’s not an arrow wings the sky, But fancy turns its point to him. No more she brings with footstep light AL HASSAN’S falchion for the fight; And—had he look’d with clearer sight, Had not the mists, that ever rise From a foul spirit, dimm’d his eyes— He would have mark’d her shuddering frame, When from the field of blood he came, The faltering speech—the look estrang’d— Voice, step, and life, and beauty chang’d— He would have mark’d all this, and known Such change is wrought by Love alone! Ah! not the Love, that should have bless’d So young, so innocent a breast; Not the pure, open, prosperous Love, That, pledg’d on earth and seal’d above, Grows in the world’s approving eyes, In friendship’s smile and home’s caress, Collecting all the heart’s sweet ties Into one knot of happiness! No, HINDA, no,—thy fatal flame Is nurs’d in silence, sorrow, shame;— A passion, without hope or pleasure, In thy soul’s darkness buried deep, It lies, like some ill-gotten treasure,— Some idol, without shrine or name, O’er which its pale-eyed votaries keep Unholy watch, while others sleep.