15.07.2007, 13:59
Young Love
The nimble fancy of all-beauteous Greece,
Fabled young love an everlasting boy,
That held of nature an eternal lease
Of childhood, beauty, innocence, and joy;
A bow he had, a preaty childish toy,
That would not terrify his mother’s sparrows,
And ‘twas his favourite play to sport his arrows,
Light as the glances of a wood-nymph coy.
O happy error! Musical conceit,
Of old idolatry, and youthful time!
Fit emanation of a happy clime,
Where but to live, to breathe, to be, was sweet,
And Love, tho’ even then a little cheat,
Dream’d not his craft would e’er be call’d a crime
The nimble fancy of all-beauteous Greece,
Fabled young love an everlasting boy,
That held of nature an eternal lease
Of childhood, beauty, innocence, and joy;
A bow he had, a preaty childish toy,
That would not terrify his mother’s sparrows,
And ‘twas his favourite play to sport his arrows,
Light as the glances of a wood-nymph coy.
O happy error! Musical conceit,
Of old idolatry, and youthful time!
Fit emanation of a happy clime,
Where but to live, to breathe, to be, was sweet,
And Love, tho’ even then a little cheat,
Dream’d not his craft would e’er be call’d a crime