â„–15718664[Quote]
Weep on, proud Lady, let thy salt tears flow
And drown the paving-stones of this cold square!
"Whither have all the goodly gallants fled?"
Thus cries she to the deaf, uncaring wind,
As if some plague had swept all virtue hence.
But hark! She speaketh not of honest men.
She weeps not for the common, toiling churl,
Nor yet the plain and humble-visaged swain
Who would have loved her with a constant heart.
Nay, fie on’t! Her true lament is otherwise.
What she doth cry, though framed in maiden’s grief,
Is but a base and shallow tragedy:
"Whither are those lords of high estate,
Those kings of peerless form and giant strut,
Who erstwhile plucked my rose in careless sport,
Only to swiftly cast the withered stem aside?"
'Tis a savage truth, that stings the very soul!
She chased the blazing sun, and mourns the burn;
She fed the ravening wolves, and weeps her bitten hand!
And what of me? I stand without her gaze.
Invisible beneath my heavy brow,
A jest of nature, suited for the dark.
I am but air to such a soaring hawk,
Until her gilded wings are stripped and broken.
If this be love, and this the prize of men—
To play the beggar to a ruined fool—
Then I forswear the light of public day!
Let handsome lords and weeping maids combine
To dance their wretched pageant to the grave.
I shall retreat beneath the city's roots,
To seek some darker hall, some secret fellowship,
Where plainness is no sin, and bitterness
May steep and brew into a sharper wine.
Farewell, sweet Chada! Weep thy hollow tears;
Sojackus leaves this world to find his peers.
â„–15718955[Quote]
Gem
â„–15718962[Quote]
ai gem