If with too rude a hand I snatch'd the rose
From thy fair fingers, think me not unkind;
For no less doth the sudden gust that blows
The flowers tender petals from their stem,
Love what it robs, than Summer's gentler wind
That hardly shakes the morning's dewy gem
From its frail hold amid the cluster'd leaves:
For does not each repay the seeming theft?
And if my fancy from my feelings weaves—
(For thee, fair lady, whom I have bereft
Of a sweet emblem of thyself)—a song.—
Wilt thou not pardon me, and from thy mind
Blot all remembrance of the seeming wrong,
And hold me guiltless as the fitful wind?