To Edward Williams.

1.     The serpent is shut out from Paradise.     The wounded deer must seek the herb no more     In which its heart-cure lies:     The widowed dove must cease to haunt a bower     Like that from which its mate with feigned sighs     Fled in the April hour.     I too must seldom seek again     Near happy friends a mitigated pain.     2.     Of hatred I am proud, - with scorn content;     Indifference, that once hurt me, now is grown     Itself indifferent;     But, not to speak of love, pity alone     Can break a spirit already more than bent.     The miserable one     Turns the mind's poison into food, -     Its medicine is tears, - its evil good.     3.     Therefore, if now I see you seldomer,     Dear friends, dear FRIEND! know that I only fly     Your looks, because they stir     Griefs that should sleep, and hopes that cannot die:     The very comfort that they minister     I scarce can bear, yet I,     So deeply is the arrow gone,     Should quickly perish if it were withdrawn.     4.     When I return to my cold home, you ask     Why I am not as I have ever been.     YOU spoil me for the task     Of acting a forced part in life's dull scene, -     Of wearing on my brow the idle mask     Of author, great or mean,     In the world's carnival. I sought     Peace thus, and but in you I found it not.     5.     Full half an hour, to-day, I tried my lot     With various flowers, and every one still said,     'She loves me - loves me not.'     And if this meant a vision long since fled -     If it meant fortune, fame, or peace of thought -     If it meant, - but I dread     To speak what you may know too well:     Still there was truth in the sad oracle.     6.     The crane o'er seas and forests seeks her home;     No bird so wild but has its quiet nest,     When it no more would roam;     The sleepless billows on the ocean's breast     Break like a bursting heart, and die in foam,     And thus at length find rest:     Doubtless there is a place of peace     Where MY weak heart and all its throbs will cease.     7.     I asked her, yesterday, if she believed     That I had resolution. One who HAD     Would ne'er have thus relieved     His heart with words, - but what his judgement bade     Would do, and leave the scorner unrelieved.     These verses are too sad     To send to you, but that I know,     Happy yourself, you feel another's woe.