He loves not well whose love is bold!
I would not have thee come too nigh:
The sun’s gold would not seem pure gold
Unless the sun were in the sky;
To take him thence and chain him near
Would make his beauty disappear.
He keeps his state,—keep thou in thine,
And shine upon me from afar!
So shall I bask in light divine,...
Like souls that balance joy and pain,
With tears and smiles from heaven again
The maiden Spring upon the plain
Came in a sun-lit fall of rain.
In crystal vapor everywhere
Blue isles of heaven laughed between,
And far, in forest-deeps unseen,
The topmost elm-tree gathered green
From draughts of balmy air.
...
You must wake and call me early, call me early, mother dear;
To-morrow ’ll be the happiest time of all the glad new-year,—
Of all the glad new-year, mother, the maddest, merriest day;
For I ’m to be Queen o’ the May, mother, I ’m to be Queen o’ the May.
There ’s many a black, black eye, they say, but none so bright as mine;
There ’s Margaret and Mary,...
From “Romeo and Juliet,” Act I. Sc. 4.
O, THEN, I see, Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies’ midwife; and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men’s noses as they lie asleep:
Her wagon-spokes made of long spinners’ legs;
The...
From “a Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Act II. Sc. 1.
OBERON.—My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou remember’st
Since once I sat upon a promontory,
And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin’s back,
Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath,
That the rude sea grew civil at her song,
And certain stars shot madly from their spheres,
To hear the sea-maid’s...
The Color of a Queen, is this —
The Color of a Sun
At setting — this and Amber —
Beryl — and this, at Noon —
And when at night — Auroran widths
Fling suddenly on men —
'Tis this — and Witchcraft — nature keeps
A Rank — for Iodine —
THE Queen of Beauty, t'other day
(As the Elysian journals say).
To ease herself of all her cares,
And better carry on affairs;
By privy-council mov'd above,
And Cupid minister of love,
To keep the earth in due obedience,
Resolv'd to substitute vice-regents;
To...
