LOVE'S TRIUMPH
Reading edition
To Hart's Triumph of Chastity (destroyed by fire)
Ah, shattered form, thy beauty, chaste as frost, Once held in thrall the heart of lord and swain. While Cupid sped his strongest shafts in vain Thou didst not dream the price thy triumph cost, Or know thy charm would be forever lost, When Time with jealous wind or flood should stain Thy snowy brow in grime or part in twain Thy marble heart in fervent holocaust! Thy spell is gone; but oh, the maid whose heart Was riven by the little wing-ed god That dipped his arrow in the scarlet stream Of my own life, shall triumph over Art And Time,—my love, whose ardent pulsing blood Shall quicken other lives and reign supreme!