A FABLE. <br /> <br /> <br />Luxuriant with perennial green <br />A Myrtle young and lovely stood, <br />Sole beauty of the wintry scene, <br />The fairest daughter of the wood: <br />Close by her side a Bramble grew, <br />Like other Brambles rude with thorn, <br />Who sicken'd at the pleasing view, <br />Yet what she envied seem'd to scorn: <br />Full oft to blast each hated charm <br />She call'd the fiery bolts of Jove; <br />But Jove was too polite to harm <br />Aught sacred to the Queen of Love: <br />Yet was her rage not wholly cross'd, <br />Boreas was to her wishes kind, <br />And from his magazines of frost <br />He summon'd forth the keenest wind. <br />A thousand clouds surcharg'd with rain <br />The ruffian god around him calls; <br />Then blows intense, and o'er the plain <br />A fleecy deluge instant falls: <br />No more the Myrtle bears the belle, <br />No more her leaves luxuriant shew, <br />The thorny Bramble looks as well, <br />Powder'd, and perriwig'd with snow. <br />Sure some gray antiquated maid, <br />The very Bramble of her sex, <br />To each invidious power has pray'd, <br />Our eyes and senses to perplex. <br />Fashion with more than Boreas' rage <br />A universal snow has shed, <br />And given the hoary tint of age <br />To every lovely female's head. <br />O break thy rival's hated spell, <br />Kind Nature! that where'er we ramble, <br />Thy work from Courtoi's we may tell, <br />And know a Myrtle from a Bramble.<br /><br />Henry James Pye<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-myrtle-and-the-bramble/
