Richmond Enquirer

POETRY.

PORTRAIT PAINTING BY L. E. L.

Divinest art, the stars above
Were fated on thy birth to shine;
Oh, born of beauty and of love,
What early poetry was thine!
The softness of Ionian night
Upon Ionian summer lay,
One planet gave its vesper light,
Enough to guide a lover's way;
And gave the fountain as it played
The semblance of a silvery shower,
And as its waters fell they made
A music meet for such an hour:
That, and the tones the gentle wind
Won from the leaf, as from a lute,
In natural melody combined,
Now that all ruder sound was mute;
And odours floated on the air,
As many a nymph had just unbound
The wreath that brailed her dark hair,
And flung the fragrant tresses round.
Pillow'd on violet leaves, which pressed
Fill'd the sweet chamber with their sighs,
Lull'd by the lyre's low notes to rest,
A Grecian youth in slumber lies;
And at his side a maiden stands,
The dark hair braided on her brow,
The lute within her slender hands,
But hush'd is all its music now.
She would not wake him from his dreams,
Although she has so much to say,
Although the morning's earliest beams
Will see her warrior far away:
How fond and earnest is the gaze
Upon those sleeping features thrown,
She who yet never dared to raise
Her timid eyes to meet his own.
She bends her lover's rest above,
Thoughtful with gentle hopes and fears,
And that unutterable love
Which never yet spoke but in tears!
She would not that those tears should fall
Upon the cherished sleeper's face;
She turns, and sees upon the wall
Its imaged shade, its perfect grace,
With eager hand she mark'd each line-
The shadowy brow, the arching head-
Till some creative power divine
Love's likeness o'er love's shadow spread.
Since then, what passion and what power
Has dwelt upon the painter's art!
How has it soothed the absent hour,
With locks that wear life's loveliest part!