Nor plains at morn, nor groves at noon delight. 80
DAPHNIS.
Sylvia ‘s like autumn ripe, yet mild as May,
More bright than noon, yet fresh as early day:
Ev’n spring displeases, when she shines not here,
But bless’d with her, ‘t is spring throughout the year.
STREPHON.
Say, Daphnis, say, in what glad soil appears 85
A wondrous tree, that sacred monarchs bears?
Tell me but this, and I ‘ll disclaim the prize,
And give the conquest to thy Sylvia’s eyes.
DAPHNIS.
Nay, tell me first, in what more happy fields
The thistle springs, to which the lily yields: 90
And then a nobler prize I will resign;
For Sylvia, charming Sylvia, shall be thine.
DAMON.
Cease to contend; for, Daphnis, I decree
The bowl to Strephon, and the lamb to thee.
Blest swains, whose nymphs in ev’ry grace excel; 95
Blest nymphs, whose swains those graces sing so well!
Now rise, and haste to yonder woodbine bowers,
A soft retreat from sudden vernal showers;
The turf with rural dainties shall be crown’d,
While opening blooms diffuse their sweets around. 100
For see! the gath’ring flocks to shelter tend.
And from the Pleiads fruitful showers descend.
Summer; or, Alexis
To Dr. Garth
A SHEPHERD’S boy (he seeks no better name)
Led forth his flocks along the silver Thame,
Where dancing sunbeams on the waters play’d
And verdant alders form’d a quiv’ring shade.
Soft as he mourn’d, the streams forgot to flow, 5
The flocks around a dumb compassion show,
The Naïads wept in ev’ry wat’ry bower,
And Jove consented in a silent shower.
Accept, O Garth! the Muse’s early lays,
That adds this wreath of ivy to thy bays; 10
Hear what from love unpractis’d hearts endure,
From love, the sole disease thou canst not cure.
Ye shady beeches, and ye cooling streams,
Defence from Phœbus’, not from Cupid’s beams,
To you I mourn; nor to the deaf I sing: 15
The woods shall answer, and their echo ring.
The hills and rocks attend my doleful lay,
Why art thou prouder and more hard than they?
The bleating sheep with my complaints agree,
They parch’d with heat, and I inflamed by thee. 20
The sultry Sirius burns the thirsty plains,
While in thy heart eternal Winter reigns.
Where stray ye, Muses! in what lawn or grove,
While your Alexis pines in hopeless love?
In those fair fields where sacred Isis glides, 25
Or else where Cam his winding vales divides?
As in the crystal spring I view my face,
Fresh rising blushes paint the wat’ry glass;
But since those graces please thy eyes no more,
I shun the fountains which I sought before. 30
Once I was skill’d in ev’ry herb that grew,
And ev’ry plant that drinks the morning dew;
Ah, wretched shepherd, what avails thy art,
To cure thy lambs, but not to heal thy heart!
Let other swains attend the rural care, 35
Feed fairer flocks, or richer fleeces shear:
But nigh you mountain let me tune my lays,
Embrace my love, and bind my brows with bays.
That flute is mine which Colin’s tuneful breath
Inspired when living, and bequeath’d in death: 40
He said, ‘Alexis, take this pipe, the same
That taught the groves my Rosalinda’s name.’
But now the reeds shall hang on yonder tree,
Forever silent, since despised by thee.
Oh! were I made by some transforming power 45
The captive bird that sings within thy bower!
Then might my voice thy list’ning ears employ,
And I those kisses he receives enjoy.
And yet my numbers please the rural throng,
Rough satyrs dance, and Pan applauds the song; 50
The nymphs, forsaking ev’ry cave and spring,
Their early fruit and milk-white turtles bring;
Each am’rous nymph prefers her gifts in vain.
On you their gifts are all bestow’d again.
For you the swains the fairest flowers design, 55
And in one garland all their beauties join;
Accept the wreath which you deserve alone,
In whom all beauties are comprised in one.
See what delights in sylvan scenes appear!
Descending Gods have found Elysium here. 60
In woods bright Venus with Adonis stray’d,
And chaste Diana haunts the forest-shade.
Come, lovely nymph, and bless the silent hours,
When swains from shearing seek their nightly bowers;
When weary reapers quit the sultry field, 65
And, crown’d with corn, their thanks to Ceres yield.
This harmless grove no lurking viper hides,
But in my breast the serpent Love abides.
Here bees from blossoms sip the rosy dew,
But your Alexis knows no sweets but you. 70
O deign to visit our forsaken seats,
The mossy fountains, and the green retreats!
Where’er you walk, cool gales shall fan the glade;
Trees, where you sit, shall crowd into a shade;
Where’er you tread, the blushing flowers shall rise, 75
And all things flourish where you turn your eyes.
O! how I long with you to pass my days,
Invoke the Muses, and resound your praise!
Your praise the birds shall chant in ev’ry grove,
And winds shall waft it to the powers above. 80
But would you sing, and rival Orpheus’ strain,
The wond’ring forests soon should dance again;
The moving mountains hear the powerful call,
And headlong streams hang list’ning in their fall!
But see, the shepherds shun the noonday heat, 85
The lowing herds to murmuring brooks retreat,
To closer shades the panting flocks remove:
Ye Gods! and is there no relief for love?
But soon the sun with milder rays descends
To the cool ocean, where his journey ends. 90
On me Love’s fiercer flames forever prey,
By night he scorches, as he burns by day.
Autumn; or, Hylas and Ægon
To Mr. Wycherley
BENEATH the shade a spreading beech displays,
Hylas and Ægon sung their rural lays;
This mourn’d a faithless, that an absent love,
And Delia’s name and Doris’ fill’d the grove.
Ye Mantuan Nymphs, your sacred succour bring, 5
Hylas and Ægon’s rural lays I sing.
Thou, whom the Nine with Plautus’ wit inspire,
The art of Terence, and Menander’s fire;
Whose sense instructs us, and whose humour charms,
Whose judgment sways us, and whose spirit warms! 10
O, skill’d in Nature! see the hearts of swains,
Their artless passions, and their tender pains.
Now setting Phœbus shone serenely bright,
And fleecy clouds were streak’d with purple light;
When tuneful Hylas, with melodious moan, 15
Taught rocks to weep, and made the mountains groan.
Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs away!
To Delia’s ear the tender notes convey.
As some sad tur
tle his lost love deplores,
And with deep murmurs fills the sounding shores; 20
Thus, far from Delia, to the winds I mourn,
Alike unheard, unpitied, and forlorn.
Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs along!
For her, the feather’d quires neglect their song;
For her, the limes their pleasing shades deny; 25
For her, the lilies hang their heads and die.
Ye flowers that droop, forsaken by the spring,
Ye birds that, left by Summer, cease to sing,
Ye trees, that fade when Autumn-heats remove,
Say, is not absence death to those who love? 30
Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs away!
Curs’d be the fields that cause my Delia’s stay!
Fade ev’ry blossom, wither ev’ry tree,
Die ev’ry flower, and perish all but she!
What have I said? Where’er my Delia flies, 35
Let Spring attend, and sudden flowers arise!
Let op’ning roses knotted oaks adorn,
And liquid amber drop from ev’ry thorn!
Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs along!
The birds shall cease to tune their ev’ning song, 40
The winds to breathe, the waving woods to move,
And streams to murmur, ere I cease to love.
Not bubbling fountains to the thirsty swain,
Not balmy sleep to lab’rers faint with pain,
Not showers to larks, nor sunshine to the bee, 45
Are half so charming as thy sight to me.
Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs away!
Come, Delia, come; ah, why this long delay?
Thro’ rocks and caves the name of Delia sounds,
Delia, each cave and echoing rock rebounds. 50
Ye Powers, what pleasing frenzy soothes my mind!
Do lovers dream, or is my Delia kind?
She comes, my Delia comes! — Now cease, my lay,
And cease, ye gales, to bear my sighs away!
Next Ægon sung, while Windsor groves admired: 55
Rehearse, ye Muses, what yourselves inspired.
Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful strain!
Of perjur’d Doris dying I complain:
Here where the mountains, less’ning as they rise,
Lose the low vales, and steal into the skies: 60
While lab’ring oxen, spent with toil and heat,
In their loose traces from the field retreat:
While curling smokes from village-tops are seen,
And the fleet shades glide o’er the dusky green.
Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful lay! 65
Beneath yon poplar oft we pass’d the day:
Oft on the rind I carv’d her am’rous vows,
While she with garlands hung the bending boughs:
The garlands fade, the vows are worn away;
So dies her love, and so my hopes decay. 70
Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful strain!
Now bright Arcturus glads the teeming grain,
Now golden fruits on loaded branches shine,
And grateful clusters swell with floods of wine;
Now blushing berries paint the yellow grove: 75
Just Gods! shall all things yield returns but love?
Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful lay!
The shepherds cry, ‘Thy flocks are left a prey’ —
Ah! what avails it me the flocks to keep,
Who lost my heart while I preserv’d my sheep! 80
Pan came, and ask’d, ‘What magic caus’d my smart,
Or what ill eyes malignant glances dart?’
What eyes but hers, alas, have power to move!
And is there magic but what dwells in love?
Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful strains! 85
I ‘ll fly from shepherds, flocks, and flow’ry plains;
From shepherds, flocks, and plains, I may remove,
Forsake mankind, and all the world — but Love!
I know thee, Love! on foreign mountains bred,
Wolves gave thee suck, and savage tigers fed. 90
Thou wert from Ætna’s burning entrails torn,
Got by fierce whirlwinds, and in thunder born!
Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful lay!
Farewell, ye woods; adieu the light of day!
One leap from yonder cliff shall end my pains, 95
No more, ye hills, no more resound my strains!
Thus sung the shepherds till th’ approach of night,
The skies yet blushing with departing light,
When fallen dews with spangles deck’d the glade,
And the low sun had lengthen’d ev’ry shade. 100
Winter; or, Daphne
To the Memory of Mrs. Tempest
LYCIDAS.
THYRSIS! the music of that murm’ring spring
Is not so mournful as the strains you sing;
Nor rivers winding thro’ the vales below
So sweetly warble, or so smoothly flow.
Now sleeping flocks on their soft fleeces lie, 5
The moon, serene in glory, mounts the sky;
While silent birds forget their tuneful lays,
O sing of Daphne’s fate, and Daphne’s praise!
THYRSIS.
Behold the groves that shine with silver frost,
Their beauty wither’d, and their verdure lost. 10
Here shall I try the sweet Alexis’ strain,
That call’d the list’ning Dryads to the plain?
Thames heard the numbers as he flow’d along,
And bade his willows learn the moving song.
LYCIDAS.
So may kind rains their vital moisture yield, 15
And swell the future harvest of the field.
Begin: this charge the dying Daphne gave,
And said, ‘Ye shepherds, sing around my grave!’
Sing, while beside the shaded tomb I mourn,
And with fresh bays her rural shrine adorn. 20
THYRSIS.
Ye gentle Muses, leave your crystal spring,
Let Nymphs and Sylvans cypress garlands bring:
Ye weeping Loves, the stream with myrtles hide,
And break your bows, as when Adonis died!
And with your golden darts, now useless grown, 25
Inscribe a verse on this relenting stone:
‘Let Nature change, let Heav’n and Earth deplore,
Fair Daphne’s dead, and Love is now no more!’
‘T is done; and Nature’s various charms decay,
See gloomy clouds obscure the cheerful day! 30
Now hung with pearls the dropping trees appear,
Their faded honours scatter’d on her bier.
See, where on earth the flow’ry glories lie,
With her they flourish’d, and with her they die.
Ah, what avail the beauties Nature wore? 35
Fair Daphne’s dead, and Beauty is no more!
For her the flocks refuse their verdant food,
The thirsty heifers shun the gliding flood;
The silver swans her hapless fate bemoan,
In notes more sad than when they sing their own; 40
In hollow caves sweet Echo silent lies,
Silent, or only to her name replies;
Her name with pleasure once she taught the shore;
Now Daphne’s dead, and Pleasure is no more!
No grateful dews descend from ev’ning skies, 45
Nor morning odours from the flowers arise;
No rich perfumes refresh the fruitful field,
Nor fragrant herbs their native incense yield.
The balmy zephyrs, silent since her death,
Lament the ceasing of a sweeter breath; 50
Th’ industrious bees neglect their golden store:
Fair Daphne’s dead, and sweetness is no more!
No more th
e mountain larks, while Daphne sings,
Shall, list’ning in mid-air, suspend their wings;
No more the birds shall imitate her lays, 55
Or, hush’d, with wonder, hearken from the sprays;
No more the streams their murmurs shall forbear,
A sweeter music that their own to hear;
But tell the reeds, and tell the vocal shore,
Fair Daphne’s dead, and music is no more! 60
Her fate is whisper’d by the gentle breeze,
And told in sighs to all the trembling trees;
The trembling trees, in every plain and wood,
Her fate remurmur to the silver flood;
The silver flood, so lately calm, appears 65
Swell’d with new passion, and o’erflows with tears;
The winds and trees and floods her death deplore,
Daphne, our Grief, our Glory now no more!
But see! where Daphne wond’ring mounts on high
Above the clouds, above the starry sky! 70
Eternal beauties grace the shining scene,
Fields ever fresh, and groves for ever green!
There while you rest in amaranthine bowers,
Or from those meads select unfading flowers,
Behold us kindly, who your name implore, 75
Daphne, our Goddess, and our Grief no more!
LYCIDAS.
How all things listen, while thy Muse complains!
Such silence waits on Philomela’s strains,
In some still ev’ning, when the whisp’ring breeze
Pants on the leaves, and dies upon the trees. 80
To thee, bright Goddess, oft a lamb shall bleed,
If teeming ewes increase my fleecy breed.
While plants their shade, or flowers their odours give,
Thy name, thy honour, and thy praise shall live!
THYRSIS.
But see, Orion sheds unwholesome dews; 85
Arise, the pines a noxious shade diffuse;
Sharp Boreas blows, and Nature feels decay,
Time conquers all, and we must Time obey.
Adieu, ye vales, ye mountains, streams, and groves;
Adieu, ye shepherds’ rural lays and loves; 90
Adieu, my flocks; farewell, ye sylvan crew;
Daphne, farewell; and all the world adieu!
WINDSOR FOREST
Inspired by the setting of his home in Binfield, Berkshire, close to Windsor’s forest, this poem was written at two different times; the first being completed in 1704, at the same time as the Pastorals and the latter part was not added till 1713, when it was first published. The poem concerns the peaceful triumph of Utrecht, resulting from the War of the Spanish Succession, in the Dutch city of Utrecht in March and April 1713.
Pope as a young man
Alexander Pope - Delphi Poets Series Page 13