| NOW, by the blessed Paphian queen, | |
| Who heaves the breast of sweet sixteen; | |
| By every name I cut on bark | |
| Before my morning star grew dark; | |
| By Hymen's torch, by Cupid's dart, | 5 |
| By all that thrills the beating heart; | |
| The bright black eye, the melting blue,— | |
| I cannot choose between the two. | |
| |
| I had a vision in my dreams;— | |
| I saw a row of twenty beams; | 10 |
| From every beam a rope was hung, | |
| In every rope a lover swung; | |
| I asked the hue of every eye, | |
| That bade each luckless lover die; | |
| Ten shadowy lips said, heavenly blue, | 15 |
| And ten accused the darker hue. | |
| |
| I asked a matron which she deemed | |
| With fairest light of beauty beamed; | |
| She answered, some thought both were fair,— | |
| Give her blue eyes and golden hair. | 20 |
| I might have liked her judgment well, | |
| But, as she spoke, she rung the bell, | |
| And all her girls, nor small nor few, | |
| Came marching in,—their eyes were blue. | |
| |
| I asked a maiden; back she flung | 25 |
| The locks that round her forehead hung, | |
| And turned her eye, a glorious one, | |
| Bright as a diamond in the sun, | |
| On me, until beneath its rays | |
| I felt as if my hair would blaze; | 30 |
| She liked all eyes but eyes of green; | |
| She looked at me; what could she mean? | |
| |
| Ah! many lids Love lurks between, | |
| Nor heeds the coloring of his screen; | |
| And when his random arrows fly, | 35 |
| The victim falls, but knows not why. | |
| Gaze not upon his shield of jet, | |
| The shaft upon the string is set; | |
| Look not beneath his azure veil, | |
| Though every limb were cased in mail. | 40 |
| |
| Well, both might make a martyr break | |
| The chain that bound him to the stake; | |
| And both, with but a single ray, | |
| Can melt our very hearts away; | |
| And both, when balanced, hardly seem | 45 |
| To stir the scales, or rock the beam; | |
| But that is dearest, all the while, | |
| That wears for us the sweetest smile. | |
