On yielding rugs in rich profusion;
While Iso long ago it seems!
For your sake smothered all my dreams
Of glory, country, proud seclusion.
All gone are youth's bright years of grace,
As from the meadow your light trace.
32
Diana's breast is charming, brothers,
And Flora's cheek, I quite agree;
But I prefer above these others
The foot of sweet Terpsichore.
It hints to probing, ardent glances
Of rich rewards and peerless trances;
Its token beauty stokes the fires,
The wilful swarm of hot desires.
My dear Elvina, I adore it
Beneath the table barely seen,
In springtime on the meadow's green,
In winter with the hearth before it,
Upon the ballroom's mirrored floor,
Or perched on granite by the shore.
33
I recollect the ocean rumbling:
O how I envied then the waves
Those rushing tides in tumult tumbling
To fall about her feet like slaves!
I longed to join the waves in pressing
Upon those feet these lips . . . caressing.
No, never midst the fiercest blaze
Of wildest youth's most fervent days
Was I so racked with yearning's anguish:
No maiden's lips were equal bliss,
No rosy cheek that I might kiss,
Or sultry breast on which to languish.
No, never once did passion's flood
So rend my soul, so flame my blood.
34
Another memory finds me ready:
In cherished dreams I sometimes stand
And hold the lucky stirrup steady,
Then feel her foot within my hand!
Once more imagination surges,
Once more that touch ignites and urges
The blood within this withered heart:
Once more the love . . . once more the dart!
But stop .. . Enough! My babbling lyre
Has overpraised these haughty things:
They're hardly worth the songs one sings
Or all the passions they inspire;
Their charming words and glances sweet
