Anna Boleyn

Stern minister of Fate severe! Who, drunk with beauty's blood, Defying time, dost linger here, And frown with ruffian visage drear, Like beacon on destruction's flood: Say!—when ambition's giddy dream First lured thy victim's heart aside, Why like a serpent didst thou hide Mid clustering flowers, and robes of pride Thy warning gleam? Had'st thou but once arisen in vision dread, From glory's fearful cliff her startled step had fled.

Ah! little she reck'd when St Edward's crown So heavily press'd her tresses fair, That with sleepless wrath, its thorns of care Would rankle within her couch of down! To the tyrant's bower, In her beauty's power, She came,—as a lamb to the lion's lair, As the light bird cleaves the fields of air, And carols blithe and sweet, while Treachery weaves its snare. Think!—what were her pangs as she traced her fate On that changeful monarch's brow of hate? What were the thoughts, which in misery's hour Throng'd o'er her soul, in her dungeon tower? Regret, with pencil keen, Retouch'd the deep'ning scene: Delightful France, whose genial skies Bade her gay childhood's pleasures rise; Earl Percy's love,—his youthful grace, Her gallant brother's fond embrace, Her stately father's feudal halls, Where proud heraldic annals deck'd the ancient walls.

Wrapt in the scaffold's gloom, Brief tenant of that living tomb She stands!—the life blood chills her heart, And her tender glance from earth does part; But her infant daughter's image fair, In the smile of innocence is there, It clings to her soul mid its last despair; And the desolate queen is doom'd to know How far a mother's grief transcends a martyr's wo.

Say! did prophetic light Illume her darkening sight, Painting the future island-queen Like the fabled bird, all hearts surprising, Bright from blood-stain'd ashes rising, Wise, energetic, bold, serene? Ah no! the scroll of time Is seal'd;—and hope sublime Rests, but on those far heights, which mortals may not climb. The dying prayer, with trembling fervor speeds, For that false monarch, by whose will she bleeds; For him, who listening on that fatal morn Hears her death signal o'er the distant lawn From the deep cannon speaking, Then springs to mirth and winds his bugle-horn, And riots while her blood is reeking;— For him she prays, in seraph tone, "Oh!—be his sins forgiven! Who raised me to an earthly throne, And sends me now, from prison lone, To be a saint in heaven."