Classic Poem

I.

The melancholy pleasures bring
No healthy genial bloom,
Corrupt at root, like flowers that spring
And bud upon a tomb.

II.

They raise a joy from grief, but cloy
The mind that with them strays,
And when is vanish'd all the joy
The grief that caused it stays:

III.

So ruin, when the lightning darts,
With brightness is combined,
And so the brightness soon departs,
But leaves the scathe behind.

IV.

The moon is powerless with her beam,
To ripen or to warm;
Yet when she gazes on the stream,
Reflects in iTher form.

V.

So melancholy never tints
The mind that owns her care
With health or warmth; but only prints
Her own cold image there.