The Flower of Beauty
by George Darley (1795-1846)

Sweet in her green dell the flower of beauty slumbers,
      Lull’d by the faint breezes sighing through her hair;
Sleeps she and hears not the melancholy numbers
      Breathed to my sad lute ’mid the lonely air.

Down from the high cliffs the rivulet is teeming
      To wind round the willow banks that lure him from above:
O that in tears, from my rocky prison streaming,
      I too could glide to the bower of my love!

Ah! where the woodbines with sleepy arms have wound her,
      Opes she her eyelids at the dream of my lay,
Listening, like the dove, while the fountains echo round her,
      To her lost mate’s call in the forests far away.

Come then, my bird! For the peace thou ever bearest,
      Still Heaven’s messenger of comfort to me—
Come—this fond bosom, O faithfullest and fairest,
      Bleeds with its death-wound, its wound of love for thee!

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