SONG FOR‘ TASSO’.

I loved — alas! our life is love;

But when we cease to breathe and move

I do suppose love ceases too.

I thought, but not as now I do,

Keen thoughts and bright of linked lore,

Of all that men had thought before.

And all that Nature shows, and more.

And still I love and still I think,

But strangely, for my heart can drink

The dregs of such despair, and live,

And love;...

And if I think, my thoughts come fast,

I mix the present with the past,

And each seems uglier than the last.

Sometimes I see before me flee

A silver spirit's form, like thee,

O Leonora, and I sit

... still watching it,

Till by the grated casement's ledge

It fades, with such a sigh, as sedge

Breathes o'er the breezy streamlet's edge.