The Posthumous Works of Ann Eliza Bleecker/On Reading Dryden's Virgil

by Ann Eliza Bleecker

Now cease these tears, lay gentle Vigil by,
Let recent sorrows dim the pausing eye:
Shall Æneas for lost Creusa mourn,
And tears be wanting on Abella's urn?
Like him I lost my fair one in my flight
From cruel foes---and in the dead of night.
Shall he lament the fall of Illion's tow'rs,
And we not mourn the sudden ruin of our's?
See York on fire---while borne by winds each flame
Projects its glowing sheet o'er half the main:
Th' affrighted savage, yelling with amaze,
From Allegany sees the rolling blaze.
Far from these scenes of horror, in the shade
I saw my aged parent safe convey'd;
Then sadly follow'd to the friendly land,
With my surviving infant by the hand.
No cumb'rous houshold gods had I indeed
To load my shoulders, and my flight impede;
The hero's idols sav'd by him remain;
My gods took care of me---not I of them!
The Trojan saw Anchises breathe his last,
When all domestic dangers he had pass'd:
So my lov'd parent, after she had fled,
Lamented, perish'd on a stranger's bed.
---He held his way o'er the Cerulian Main,
But I return'd to hostile fields again.