The Bird Of Jove, Stoop'd

O Fairest Flower! No Sooner Blown But Blasted, Soft Silken Primrose Fading Timelessly.

Hope Elevates, And Joy Brightens His Crest.

Beauty Is Nature's Coin, Must Not Be Hoarded, But Must Be Current, And The Good Thereof Consists In Mutual And Partaken Bliss.

O Loss Of Sight, Of Thee I Most Complain! Blind Among Enemies, O Worse Than Chains, Dungeon Or Beggary, Or Decrepit Age! Light, The Prime Work Of God, To Me Is Extinct, And All Her Various Objects Of Delight Annulled, Which Might In Part My Grief Have Eased. Inferior To The Vilest Now Become Of Man Or Worm; The Vilest Here Excel Me, They Creep, Yet See; I, Dark In Light, Exposed To Daily Fraud, Contempt, Abuse And Wrong, Within Doors, Or Without, Still As A Fool, In Power Of Others, Never In My Own; Scarce Half I Seem To Live, Dead More Than Half.

And As An Ev'ning Dragon Came, Assailant On The Perched Roosts And Nests In Order Rang'd Of Tame Villatic Fowl.