Anacreon Poems

I will; I will; the conflict's past,
And I'll consent to love at last.
Cupid has long, with smiling art,
Invited me to yield my heart;
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Grasshopper thrice-happy! who
Sipping the cool morning dew,
Queen-like chirpest all the day
Seated on some verdant spray;
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Young men dancing, and the old
Sporting I with joy behold;
But an old man gay and free
Dancing most I love to see;
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Tell me, why, my sweetest dove,
Thus your humid pinions move,
Shedding through the air in showers
Essence of the balmiest flowers?
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Not to love a pain is deem'd,
And to love's the same esteem'd:
But of all the greatest pain
Is to love unlov'd again.
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Count me, on the summer trees,
Every leaf that courts the breeze;
Count me, on the foamy deep,
Every wave that sinks to sleep;
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Give me the harp of epic song,
Which Homer's finger thrill'd along;
But tear away the sanguine string,
For war is not the theme I sing.
Proclaim the laws of festal rite,
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And now with all thy pencil's truth,
Portray Bathyllus, lovely youth!
Let his hair, in lapses bright,
Fall like streaming rays of light;
And there the raven's die confuse
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Downward was the wheeling Bear
Driven by the Waggoner:
Men by powerful sleep opprest,
Gave their busy troubles rest;
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I divine Lyæus prize,
Who with mirth and wit supplies:
Compass'd with a jovial quire,
I affect to touch the lyre:
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