DISAPPOINTMENT. YE shepherds! give ear to my lay, She was fair and my passion begun ; Perhaps I was void of all thought; Perhaps it was plain to foresee That a nymph so complete would be sought By a swain more engaging than me. Ah! love every hope can inspire, It banishes wisdom the while, And the lip of the nymph we admire She is faithless and I am undone; Ye that witness the woes I endure, Let reason instruct you to shun What it cannot instruct you to cure. Beware how you loiter in vain Amid nymphs of an higher degree; It is not for me to explain How fair and how fickle they be. Alas! from the day that we met, What hope of an end to my woes? The glance that undid my repose. The sweets of a dew-sprinkled rose, The sound of a murmuring stream, The peace which from solitude flows, Henceforth shall be Corydon's theme. High transports are shewn to the sight, But we are not to find them our own; Fate never bestow'd such delight As I with my Phyllis had known. O ye woods! spread your branches apace, To your deepest recesses I fly, I would hide with the beasts of the chase, I would vanish from every eye. Yet my reed shall resound thro' the grove With the same sad complaint it begun; How she smil'd, and I could not but love! Was faithless, and I am undone ! |