To Melancholy Poem by Janetta Philipps

When life's first dawn breaks on the raptured view,
And smiles each various scene so bright and new,
The Passions, thronging round the youthful heart,
Their glowing visions to the soul impart:
Nor dream we once that guests so sweet and fair,
Like smiling foes, such deadly poisons bear:
Their fatal gifts the bosom's peace destroy,
Though soft they breathe of harmony and joy.
When salient founts bade Eden's blossoms blow,
Did lovelier flowrets on their borders grow
Than bloomed in that gay wreath Affection wove,
To bind the heart in links of social love ?

But ah! how oft the mournful circlet waves
Its withering honours o'er untimely graves!
No star that trembles in the evening sky
Beams half so soft as Pity's melting eye,
When meek that eye in dewy lustre shone
For other's griefs, but ne'er had wept its own.
Enraptured Joy the imaged future gave,
Bright as the sunbeam on the western wave;
His shadowy world a new Elysium grew,
And smiling Hope affirmed the vision true.
False flattering vision !- promise given in vain,
The looked-for pleasure changes into pain:
Not faster fade the rosy tints of day
That streak the folds of twilight's mantle grey.
Ah ! then no more to Joy my strains belong,
A milder influence claims my votive song:
Thee, gentlest Melancholy! thee, I hail,
And woo to wrap me in that sable veil

Which shuts life's sunny pictures from the view,
Deceitful pictures !- fair, but never true.
Yet wilt thou listen to so mean a lay,
When witching numbers once invoked thy sway ?
And he, whose loftier themes were high and holy,
Has sung the ' pensive nun,' sweet Melancholy?
Not mine such power as his, whose strain divine
In chastened lustre gave thy charms to shine;
What time thou ledd'st him to the twilight grove,
Where Philomel poured soft her song of love,
With warblings sweet she hailed the western star;
But oh! her Poet's notes were sweeter far
To him, though this low world was hid in night,
Clear shone the beam of intellectual light ;
O'er the rapt Bard, as slow he struck the lyre,
High Inspiration flashed Promethean fire;
The beamy splendours wreathed the laurel bough,
And shed a dazzling glory round his brow.

I woo thee, Nymph, to wake the plaintive measure
That tells of feelings sad the mournful pleasure;
To sing of Knights, who for their Lady's grace
In Fame's proud record won distinguished place:
Ah! vainly won- when soon in mingled breath
Sound glory's hymns and the low dirge of death.
Or bear me with thee, when pale Cynthia shrouds
Her crescent dim in veil of silvery clouds,
To cypress shades, through whose long vista seen
The tombstones whiten o'er some village green;
There she, who saw her early love expire,
Still cherishes Affection's vestal fire,
Bids the pale splendor her sad path illume,
And hails the ray, though bursting from the tomb.
There bends the wretched mother o'er the grave
Of her whom long she fondly sought to save:
Hers is no frenzied shriek of anguish wild;
With lilies fair she strews her fairer child;

And calm though sad breathes in high Mercy's ear
The soul's lament, which only Heaven should bear.
When from some distant rock the beacon's light
Gleams a faint star to crown the brow of night,
Oft let me meet thee on the lonely shore,
Where gathering tempests threat with sullen roar;
And flitting sea-birds shriek with feeble cry,
Seared by the lurid red that streaks the western sky.
Or when the blast of Autumn, sweeping low,
In fitful moanings seems to speak of woe,
Deep musing let me list the cadence sweet
Of dashing waters, murmuring at my feet;
Or sound of that sweet harp, whose magic tone
Seems the soft music of a world unknown.
Oh ! I could dream, that Bards of other days
Joined its wild melody with solemn lays;
That on the breeze their thrilling vespers flow,

Or angel voices mourn for mortal woe,
And let the muse of Tragedy be nigh,
With tresses loose. and spirit-beaming eye;
Her veil dark waving o'er her snowy breast,
Her tearful glance to pitying Heaven addrest.
Hers be the soul-fraught strain, with fear that awes,
Or wakes a gentler throb in Pity's cause;
When Basil, who could war and death defy,
Falls by the witching glance from Beauty's eye.
Nor mourn we more the gallant hero lost
Than Montford- by Hate's fiercest tempest tost;
Scarce soothed by her, in whom each grace combined
That purest image of a heavenly mind,
The high-souled sister, whom Affection led
To watch beside the dying murderer's bed,
With seraph sweetness bid his frenzy cease,
And to his parting spirit whisper peace.

Oh Melancholy ! whilst such power is thine.
To sooth the mind, to soften, to refine,
Ne'er let me quit thy soul-ennobling themes
For Mirth's light laugh, or Pleasure's gayest dreams:
To other hearts let frolic Joy be dear,
I love thy pensive smile, soft mingling with a tear.