Ann Eliza Bleecker (1752–1783)

DEAR Kitty, while you rove through sylvan bowers,

Inhaling fragrance from salubrious flowers,

Or view your blushes mantling in the stream,

When Luna gilds it with her amber beam;

The brazen voice of war awakes our fears,

Impearling every damask cheek with tears

The savage, rushing down the echoing vales,

Frights the poor hind with ill portending yells;

A livid white his consort’s cheeks invest;

She drops her blooming infant from her breast;

She tries to fly, but quick recoiling sees

The painted Indian issuing from the trees;

Then life suspensive sinks her on the plain,

Till dire explosions wake her up again.

Oh, horrid sight! her partner is no more;

Pale is his corse, or only tinged with gore;

Her playful babe is dash’d against the stones,

Its scalp torn off, and fractured all its bones.

Where are the dimpling smiles it lately wore?

Ghastly in agony it smiles no more!

Dumb with amaze, and stupefied with grief,

The captured wretch must now attend her chief:

Reluctantly she quits the scene of blood,

When lo! a sudden light illumes the wood;

She turns, and sees the rising fires expand,

And conflagration roll through half the land;

The western flames to orient skies are driven,

And change the azure to a sable heaven.

Such are our woes, my dear, and be it known

Many still suffer what I tell of one:

No more Albania’s sons in slumber lie,

When Cynthia’s crescent gleams along the sky;

But every street patrole, and through the night

Their beamy arms reflect a dreadful light.

Excuse, dear girl, for once this plaintive strain;

I must conclude, lest I transgress again.