Alexander Pope addresses a lady whose singing and lute-playing leave him utterly undone. He playfully begs her to stop, warning that her voice only deepens a wound her eyes have already made. With his heart already conquered, the added assault of her song is like winds and lightning striking a helpless ship at once. Her music, he says, would be celestial if an angel performed it—but that very perfection is what threatens him: her “killing charms” seem determined to unmake him before such an unearthly sound can be heard among the living.
The comparison to Orpheus sharpens both the compliment and the mood. Orpheus charmed trees into following him; this lady’s hands turn the wooden lute into something even more powerful. It doesn’t just enchant nature—it draws in the enraptured poet himself. The tone mingles delicate flattery with a shiver of genuine surrender, creating an atmosphere that is at once elegant, warm, and lightly breathless with adoration.