The Gossamer

Over faded heath-flowers spun, or thorny furze, The filmy gossamer is lightly spread; Waving in every sighing air that stirs, As fairy fingers had entwined the thread: A thousand trembling orbs of lucid dew Spangle the texture of the fairy loom, As if soft sylphs, lamenting as they flew, Had wept departed summer's transient bloom: But the wind rises, and the turf receives The glittering web:--So, evanescent, fade Bright views that youth with sanguine heart believes: So vanish schemes of bliss, by fancy made; Which, fragile as the fleeting dews of morn, Leave but the withered heath, and barren thorn!