Page:Poems - Southey (1799) volume 1.djvu/62

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Presiding Powers look down!In vain to you I pour'd my earnest prayers,In vain I sung your praises: chiefly thouVenus! ungrateful Goddess, whom my lyreHymn'd with such full devotion! Lesbian groves,Witness how often at the languid hourOf summer twilight, to the melting songYe gave your choral echoes! Grecian MaidsWho hear with downcast look and flushing cheekThat lay of love, bear witness! and ye youths,Who hang enraptur'd on the empassion'd strain,Gazing with eloquent eye, even till the heartSinks in the deep delirium! and ye tooShall witness, unborn Ages! to that songOf warmest zeal; ah witness ye, how hardHer fate who hymn'd the votive hymn in vain!Ungrateful Goddess! I have hung my luteIn yonder holy pile: my hand no moreShall wake the melodies that fail'd to moveThe heart of Phaon—yet when Rumour tellsHow from Leucadia Sappho hurl'd her down
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