Poems (Hale)/Ladies' Fair

by Mary Whitwell Hale

LADIES' FAIR.

O! haste ye away; 'tis the morn of the Fair;
And the lovely and happy are gathering there.
Ye would not be late on this festival day;
Then haste to love's temple, love's incense to pay.

It is well worth the visit to see the gay sight,
The ladies so smiling, the beaux so polite.
What cynical stoic a smile will deny,
Or coldly so brilliant a bevy pass by?

You will find all that fancy or art can devise,—
For your ears silver voices, your heart witching eyes.
You surely will join the gay crowd hastening there,
Ah, yes, you must visit this wonder, the Fair.

There hearts of all sizes the eye may behold,
Unlike each fair prototype, purchased with gold.
And chains, too, to weave round the bachelor's heart,
Which perchance may be captured by love's magic art.

And there waits the Sybil, your fate to reveal:
Then come at her mystical altar to kneel;
A glance of her eye can the future explore;
Your pittance of silver,—she asks for no more.

A line for sweet Belle in the post-office lies:
Ah! the secret I read by the light of your eyes.
But still of your blush no advantage I take,
So in secret and quiet the seal you may break.

Then hasten away. You will never regret,
That to-day in love's temple her children have met;
But the eye of Remembrance with rapture shall glow,
And the heart's purest fountains of pleasure shall flow.