To the Spirit of her Lover,
Which, in the phrenzy occasioned by his loss, she
imagined to pursue continually her footsteps. Attempted after the manner of Ossian.
The spirit of my lover pursues me in the wild; I fancy to see his wan figure at my side; he follows me, and speaks in a low murmuring voice. His form is habited in robes of mist, and his silvery hair undulates upon the gale.
Oh! my love, let me hear thy voice when I seek repose; let me not, when I close my eyes, lose sight of thy heavenly form. Be present still to my fond view, and let me never miss thee from my side.
Ah! thou dost not breathe; yet sometimes methinks upon my glowing cheek I feel thy breath, but it is cold and damp, not ardent as in the days of our love.
Can I not press thee to my bosom? Oh! miserable mockery! thou would’st evaporate in my embrace.
Yet do not quit me. Thy features are sunk and wan; they diminish to my troubled sight; yet they are a faint resemblance unto the charms of my beloved; and thy hair, which seems luminous, falls over thy shadowy form.
Sometimes thy features seem to waver–it must be in the twilight, when all has a dubious shade; but I cannot always catch those loved features–it appears to me as though they were fading wholly away; but suddenly, by an effort of the imagination, I again identify them, and secretly determine never more to look off of them.
How celestial dost thou appear, skimming over the tops of the hills. A faint moonbeam catches thy robes of silvery mist. I respire eagerly the bleak breeze that passes over thy dubious form; I inhale it with ardent, melancholy delight, for it is impregnated with thy spirit.
Soon will this heart of clay cease to beat; then will my soul too be free. My body, which is of concentrated atoms, shall lie by thine in the narrow grave, which it will not deny me to share with it; and then together shall our spirits wander over the mountains, or re-visit the scenes of our youth.
(Charlotte Dacre)
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Based on Topics: Love Poems, Youth Poems, Sense & Perception Poems, Hair Poems, Body Poems, Imagination & Visualization Poems, Manner Poems, Efforts PoemsBased on Keywords: respiré, diminish, occasioned, concentrated, identify, habited, evaporate, ossian, phrenzy, undulates, impregnated