Page:Poetical Works of John Oldham.djvu/32

22 Each should into a Niobe relent, At once thy mourner and thy monument: Each should become Like the famed Memnon's speaking tomb, To sing thy well-tuned praise; Nor should we fear their being dumb, Thou still wouldst make them vocal with thy rays. O that I could distil my vital juice in tears! Or waft away my soul in sobbing airs! Were I all eyes, To flow in liquid elegies; That every limb might grieve. And dying sorrow still retrieve; My life should be but one long mourning day. And like moist vapours melt in tears away. I'd soon dissolve in one great sigh, And upwards fly, Glad so to be exhaled to heaven and thee: A sigh which might well-nigh reverse thy death, And hope to animate thee with new breath; Powerful as that which heretofore did give A soul to well-formed clay, and made it live. Adieu, blest Soul! whose hasty flight away Tells heaven did ne'er display Such happiness to bless the world with stay. Death in thy fall betrayed her utmost spite, And showed her shafts most times are levelled at the white. She saw thy blooming ripeness time prevent; She saw, and envious grew, and straight her arrow sent: So buds appearing ere the frosts are past, Nipped by some unkind blast, Wither in penance for their forward haste. Thus have I seen a morn so bright, So decked with all the robes of light, As if it scorned to think of night,