Letter from Eliza Cook to Charlotte Cushman
Dublin Core
Title
Subject
Description
It is republished in Eliza Cook’s Journal on May 21, 1853.
Credit
Library of Congress, Charlotte Cushman Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.Creator
Source
Type
Poem Item Type Metadata
From
To
Text
[2972] To Miss Cushman
On seeing her play "Bianca" in
Milman's tragedy of "Fazio"
I thought thee wondrous when thy
soul pourtrayed
The youth Verona bragged of; and the love
Of glowing, Southern blood, by thee was made
enthrancing as the breath of orange grove
I felt the spirit of the great was thine:
In the rapt Boy's devotion and despair
I know thou wert a pilgrim at the shrine
Where God's high ministers alone repair
No rote learned sighing filled thy doting moans,
Thy grief was heavy, as thy joy was light;
Passion and Poesy were in thy tones,
and mind flashed forth in its electric might
I had seen many "fret and strut their hour";
But my brain never had become such slave
To Fiction, as it did beneath thy power,
Nor owned such homage as to thee it gave
[2972 reverse] I did not think thou could'st arouse
a throb
Of deeper, stronger, beating in my heart,
I did not deem thou could'st awake the +++
Of chocking fulness, and convulsive stars[?]
But thy pale madness, and thy gasping
That breathed the torture of Bianca's part[?]
Oh, never would my bosom ask to know
Such sad and better sympathy again!
When the wife's anguish sears thy hope
check,
Let crowds behold and Land thee as thy +++
But this poor breast, is shunning what
they seek,
May yield perchance a richer tribute
still
Eliza Cook
