impearl

So spake the Son, but SATAN with his Powers Farr was advanc't on winged speed, an Host Innumerable as the Starrs of Night, Or Starrs of Morning, Dew-drops, which the Sun Impearls on every leaf and every flouer.

Then I, long tried By natural ills, received the comfort fast, While budding, at thy sight, my pilgrim's staff Gave out green leaves with morning dews impearled. I seek no copy now of life's first half: Leave here the pages with long musing curled, And write me new my future's epigraph, New Angel mine, unhoped for in the world!

While Christ lay dead the widowed world Wore willow green for hope undone; Till, when bright Easter dews impearled The chilly burial earth, All north and south, all east and west, Flushed rosy in the arising sun; Hope laughed, and faith resumed her rest, And love remembered mirth.

Even the 'flowering crest,' the only sign of life in the poem, is hardened by being 'impearled and orient." (28) By the time Webster's sonnet reaches the sestet, however, the confident, vigorous rhythm flags, until the deductive phrases in the octet seem but weak syllogisms crafted by the speaker to convince herself against all good sense of the durability of spring.