Passion
SOME have won a wild delight,By daring wilder sorrow;Could I gain thy love to-night,I'd hazard death to-morrow.
Could the battle-struggle earnOne kind glance from thine eye,How this withering heart would burn,The heady fight to try !
Welcome nights of broken sleep,And days of carnage cold,Could I deem that thou wouldst weepTo hear my perils told.
Tell me, if with wandering bandsI roam full far away,Wilt thou, to those distant lands,In spirit ever stray ?
Wild, long, a trumpet sounds afar;Bid mebid me goWhere Seik and Briton meet in war,On Indian Sutlej's flow.
Blood has dyed the Sutlej's wavesWith scarlet stain, I know;Indus' borders yawn with graves,Yet, command me go !
Though rank and high the holocaustOf nations, steams to heaven,Glad I'd join the death-doomed host,Were but the mandate given.
Passion's strength should nerve my arm,Its ardour stir my life,Till human force to that dread charmShould yield and sink in wild alarm,Like trees to tempest-strife.
If, hot from war, I seek thy love,Darest thou turn aside ?Darest thou, then, my fire reprove,By scorn, and maddening pride ?
Nomy will shall yet controlThy will, so high and free,And love shall tame that haughty soulYestenderest love for me.
I'll read my triumph in thine eyes,Behold, and prove the change;Then leave, perchance, my noble prize,Once more in arms to range.
I'd die when all the foam is up,The bright wine sparkling high;Nor wait till in the exhausted cupLife's dull dregs only lie.
Then Love thus crowned with sweet reward,Hope blest with fulness large,I'd mount the saddle, draw the sword,And perish in the charge!
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