Stella's Birth-Day

MARCH 13, 1718-19

Stella this day is thirty-four,

(We shan't dispute a year or more:)

However, Stella, be not troubled,

Although thy size and years are doubled

Since first I saw thee at sixteen,

The brightest virgin on the green;

So little is thy form declined;

Made up so largely in thy mind.

O, would it please the gods to split

Thy beauty, size, and years, and wit!

No age could furnish out a pair

Of nymphs so graceful, wise, and fair;

With half the lustre of your eyes,

With half your wit, your years, and size.

And then, before it grew too late,

How should I beg of gentle fate,

(That either nymph might have her swain,)

To split my worship too in twain.

Stella to Dr. Swift

ON HIS BIRTH-DAY, NOV. 30, 1721

St. Patrick's Dean, your country's pride,

My early and my only guide,

Let me among the rest attend,

Your pupil and your humble friend,

To celebrate in female strains

The day that paid your mother's pains;

Descend to take that tribute due

In gratitude alone to you.

When men began to call me fair,

You interposed your timely care:

You early taught me to despise

The ogling of a coxcomb's eyes;

Show'd where my judgment was misplaced;

Refined my fancy and my taste.

You taught how I might youth prolong,

By knowing what was right and wrong;

How from my heart to bring supplies

Of lustre to my fading eyes;

How soon a beauteous mind repairs

The loss of changed or falling hairs;

How wit and virtue from within

Send out a smoothness o'er the skin.