1   This votive pledge of fond esteem,      Perhaps, dear girl! for me thou’lt prize;   It sings of Love’s enchanting dream,      A theme we never can despise. 2   Who blames it but the envious fool,      The old and disappointed maid;   Or pupil of the prudish school,      In single sorrow doom’d to fade? 3   Then read, dear girl! with feeling read,      For thou wilt ne’er be one of those;   To thee in vain I shall not plead      In pity for the poet’s woes. 4   He was in sooth a genuine bard;      His was no faint, fictitious flame.   Like his, may love be thy reward,      But not thy hapless fate the same.