Doth riotous laughter now replace Thy smile, and rouge, with stony glare, Thy cheek’s soft hue, and fluttering lace The kerchief that inwound thy hair? Or is it over? art thou dead?-- Dead!--and no warning shiver ran Across my heart, to say thy thread Of life was cut, and closed thy span! Could from earth’s ways that figure slight Be lost, and I not feel ’twas so? Of that fresh voice the gay delight Fail from earth’s air, and I not know? Or shall I find thee still, but changed, But not the Marguerite of thy prime? With all thy being re-arranged,-- Passed through the crucible of time; With spirit vanished, beauty waned, And hardly yet a glance, a tone, A gesture--any thing--retained Of all that was my Marguerite’s own? I will not know! For wherefore try, To things by mortal course that live, A shadowy durability, For which they were not meant, to give? Like driftwood spars, which meet and pass Upon the boundless ocean-plain, So on the sea of life, alas! Man meets man,--meets, and quits again. I knew it when my life was young; I feel it still now youth is o’er. --The mists are on the mountain hung, And Marguerite I shall see no more. _THE STRAYED REVELLER._ _THE PORTICO OF CIRCE’S PALACE. EVENING._ A YOUTH. CIRCE. THE YOUTH. Faster, faster, O Circe, goddess, Let the wild, thronging train, The bright procession Of eddying forms, Sweep through my soul! Thou standest, smiling Down on me! thy right arm, Leaned up against the column there, Props thy soft cheek; Thy left holds, hanging loosely, The deep cup, ivy-cinctured, I held but now. Is it then evening So soon? I see, the night-dews, Clustered in thick beads, dim The agate brooch-stones On thy white shoulder; The cool night-wind, too, Blows through the portico, Stirs thy hair, goddess, Waves thy white robe! CIRCE. Whence art thou, sleeper? THE YOUTH. When the white dawn first Through the rough fir-planks Of my hut, by the chestnuts, Up at the valley-head, Came breaking, goddess! I sprang up, I threw round me My dappled fawn-skin; Passing out, from the wet turf, Where they lay, by the hut door, I snatched up my vine-crown, my fir-staff, All drenched in dew,-- Came swift down to join The rout early gathered In the town, round the temple, Iacchus’ white fane On yonder hill. Quick I passed, following The woodcutters’ cart-track Down the dark valley. I saw On my left, through the beeches, Thy palace, goddess, Smokeless, empty! Trembling, I entered; beheld The court all silent, The lions sleeping, On the altar this bowl. I drank, goddess! And sank down here, sleeping, On the steps of thy portico. CIRCE.