THE crescent moon, with pallid glow,
Swept backward like a bended bow:
Across, a shaft of phantom light
Thrilled, like an arrow winged for flight.
Just when that flickering shaft was aimed
Venus in mellow radiance flamed,
Unmindful of the treacherous dart
Which seemed upreared to pierce her heart;
For, fain to smite her through and through,
Dian lay ambushed in the blue:
Half veiled from sight, still, still below,
She aimed her shaft, she clasped her bow.
For ever thus, since time was born,
Cold virtue points her shaft of scorn
At passionate love, in whose warm beam
Her own but seems a crescent dream.
