BENEATH a sad and silent shade
Afflicted Poetry was laid;
The shepherd train, the virgin choir,
No longer listen'd to her lyre;
But, all neglected and alone,
Her feeling and her fire were gone.
No zephyr fondly sued her breast,
No nightingale came there to rest;
The faded visions fled her eyes —
The visions of her ecstasies.
And if perchance she sought delight,
It was amid the gloom of night, —
It was the hour the screechowls cry,
Or roaring whirlwinds rend the sky,
To pour her melancholy strain,
And catch a pleasure from the pain.