Page:Redemption, a Poem.djvu/94

 88 REDEMPTION.

With luscious fruit, pleasing to taste or smell,

Weigh'd down, and smiling berry which the heart

Delights, or spirits cheers, their burdens yield

More pleased to her, than the fruit-bearing earth

E'er paid its tribute to that rural maid,

Who taught, 'tis said, Triptolemus to sow

And reap, and cause the fruitless trees to bear.

Or than to first of florists, Eve, who long

In Eden grateful pastime took, amidst

Its fruitful glens, its flow'ring meads and vales,

When fruits and flowers first issued, fresh and fair,

From the all-plastic Hand; and who, with sighs

And weeping, was, through her own frailty, forced

To take a last and long farewell of walks

And shades, and happy bowers, that could not bear

The taint of sinful breath, but wither'd now

At her approach, who, by her one sad fault,

Had grafted death upon their verdant stems.

Not so the pruning of the stainless Maid,

In whom fair Eden's purity and bloom

Revive afresh, nor faintest tainture know.

Her task disposed, she culls the fairest flowers,

And on a bank, by od'rous myrtles crown'd,

Sits weaving chaplets, deck'd with purest rays ;

A wond'rous work, with graceful fillets twined.

The mazy wreath but one pure gem requires

To crown its beauty, its perfection seal,

A fragrant lily, from whose snowy cup,

The breath of sweet simplicity exhales.

Elate with joy, and tripping on secure,

She seeks her fav'rite emblem of the vale.

Her motive, hov'ring near, the Tempter caught,

�� �