Alfred Tennyson (1809–1892)

[See also 1837, 1851, 1876, 1877, 1885 and 1892]

Three Sonnets to a Coquette

CARESS'D or chidden by the slender hand,

And singing airy trifles this or that,

Light Hope at Beauty's call would perch and stand,

And run thro' every change of sharp and flat;

And Fancy came and at her pillow sat,

When Sleep had bound her in his rosy band,

And chased away the still-recurring gnat,

And woke her with a lay from fairy land.

But now they live with Beauty less and less,

For Hope is other Hope and wanders far,

Nor cares to lisp in love's delicious creeds;

And Fancy watches in the wilderness,

Poor Fancy sadder than a single star,

That sets at twilight in a land of reeds.

THE form, the form alone is eloquent!

A nobler yearning never broke her rest

Than but to dance and sing, be gaily drest,

And win all eyes with all accomplishment:

Yet in the whirling dances as we went,

My fancy made me for a moment blest

To find my heart so near the beauteous breast

That once had power to rob it of content.

A moment came the tenderness of tears,

The phantom of a wish that once could move,

A ghost of passion that no smiles restore—

For ah! the slight coquette, she cannot love,

And if you kiss'd her feet a thousand years,

She still would take the praise, and care no more.