Lord Byron - Delphi Poets Series

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by Lord Byron


  And when I look on this, the petty spray

  Of my own years of trouble, which have roll’d

  Like a wild bay of breakers, melts away

  Something-I know not what-does still uphold

  A spirit of slight patience; not in vain,

  Even for its own sake, do we purchase pain.

  VI.

  Perhaps the workings of defiance stir

  Within me – or perhaps a cold despair,

  Brought on when ills habitually recur,

  Perhaps a kinder clime, or purer air,

  (For even to this may change of soul refer,

  And with light armour we may learn to bear,)

  Have taught me a strange quiet, which was not

  The chief companion of a calmer lot.

  VII.

  I feel almost at times as I have felt

  In happy childhood; trees, and flowers, and brooks,

  Which do remember me of where I dwelt

  Ere my young mind was sacrificed to books,

  Come as of yore upon me, and can melt

  My heart with recognition of their looks;

  And even at moments I could think I see

  Some living thing to love-but none like thee.

  VIII.

  Here are the Alpine landscapes which create

  A fund for contemplation;- to admire

  Is a brief feeling of a trivial date;

  But something worthier do such scenes inspire:

  Here to be lonely is not desolate’

  For much I view which I could most desire,

  And, above all, a lake I can behold

  Lovelier, not dearer, than our own of old.

  IX.

  Oh that thou wert but with me! – but I grow

  The fool of my own wishes, and forget

  The solitude which I have vaunted so

  Has lost its praise in this but one regret;

  There may be others which I less may show

  I am not of the plaintive mood, and yet

  I feel an ebb in my philosophy,

  And the tide rising in my alter’d eye.

  X.

  I did remind thee of our own dear Lake,

  By the old Hall which may be mine no more.

  Leman’s is fair; but think not I forsake

  The sweet remembrance of a dearer shore:

  Sad havoc Time must with my memory make,

  Ere that or thou can fade these eyes before;

  Though, like all things which I have loved they are

  Resign ‘d For ever, or divided far.

  XI.

  The world is all before me; I but ask

  Of Nature that with which she will comply

  It is but in her summer’s sun to bask,

  To mingle with the quiet of her sky,

  To see her gentle face without a mask,

  And never gaze on it with apathy.

  She was my early friend, and now shall be

  My sister – till I look again on thee.

  XII.

  I can reduce all feelings but this one;

  And that I would not; for at length I see

  Such scenes as those wherein my life begun.

  The earliest – even the only paths for me –

  Had I but sooner learnt the crowd to shun,

  I had been better than I now can be;

  The passions which have torn me would have slept;

  I had not suffer’d, and thou hadst not wept.

  XIII.

  With false Ambition what had I to do?

  Little with Love, and least of all with Fame;

  And yet they came unsought, and with me grew,

  And made me all which they can make -a name.

  Yet this was not the end I did pursue;

  Surely I once beheld a nobler aim.

  But all is over – I am one the more

  To baffled millions which have gone before.

  XIV.

  And for the future, this world’s future may

  From me demand but little of my care;

  I have outlived myself by many a day;

  Having survived so many things that were;

  My years have been no slumber, but the prey

  Of ceaseless vigils; for I had the share

  Of life which might have fill’d a century,

  Before its fourth in time had pass’d me by.

  XV.

  And for the remnant which may be to come

  I am content; and for the past I feel

  Not thankless,-for within the crowded sum

  Of struggles, happiness at times would steal,

  And for the present, I would not benumb

  My feelings further. – Nor shall I conceal

  That with all this I still can look around,

  And worship Nature with a thought profound.

  XVI.

  For thee, my own sweet sister, in thy heart

  I know myself secure, as thou in mine;

  We were and are – I am, even as thou art

  Beings who ne’er each other can resign;

  It is the same, together or apart,

  From life’s commencement to its slow decline

  We are entwined-let death come slow or fast,

  The tie which bound the first endures the last!

  The Dream

  I

  Our life is twofold; Sleep hath its own world,

  A boundary between the things misnamed

  Death and existence: Sleep hath its own world,

  And a wide realm of wild reality,

  And dreams in their development have breath,

  And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy;

  They leave a weight upon our waking thoughts,

  They take a weight from off waking toils,

  They do divide our being; they become

  A portion of ourselves as of our time,

  And look like heralds of eternity;

  They pass like spirits of the past -they speak

  Like sibyls of the future; they have power –

  The tyranny of pleasure and of pain;

  They make us what we were not -what they will,

  And shake us with the vision that’s gone by,

  The dread of vanished shadows -Are they so?

  Is not the past all shadow? -What are they?

  Creations of the mind? -The mind can make

  Substances, and people planets of its own

  With beings brighter than have been, and give

  A breath to forms which can outlive all flesh.

  I would recall a vision which I dreamed

  Perchance in sleep -for in itself a thought,

  A slumbering thought, is capable of years,

  And curdles a long life into one hour.

  II

  I saw two beings in the hues of youth

  Standing upon a hill, a gentle hill,

  Green and of mild declivity, the last

  As ‘twere the cape of a long ridge of such,

  Save that there was no sea to lave its base,

  But a most living landscape, and the wave

  Of woods and corn-fields, and the abodes of men

  Scattered at intervals, and wreathing smoke

  Arising from such rustic roofs: the hill

  Was crowned with a peculiar diadem

  Of trees, in circular array, so fixed,

  Not by the sport of nature, but of man:

  These two, a maiden and a youth, were there

  Gazing -the one on all that was beneath

  Fair as herself -but the boy gazed on her;

  And both were young, and one was beautiful:

  And both were young -yet not alike in youth.

  As the sweet moon on the horizon’s verge,

  The maid was on the eve of womanhood;

  The boy had few
er summers, but his heart

  Had far outgrown his years, and to his eye

  There was but one beloved face on earth,

  And that was shining on him; he had looked

  Upon it till it could not pass away;

  He had no breath, no being, but in hers:

  She was his voice; he did not speak to her,

  But trembled on her words; she was his sight,

  For his eye followed hers, and saw with hers,

  Which coloured all his objects; -he had ceased

  To live within himself: she was his life,

  The ocean to the river of his thoughts,

  Which terminated all; upon a tone,

  A touch of hers, his blood would ebb and flow,

  And his cheek change tempestuously -his heart

  Unknowing of its cause of agony.

  But she in these fond feelings had no share:

  Her sighs were not for him; to her he was

  Even as a brother -but no more; ‘twas much,

  For brotherless she was, save in the name

  Her infant friendship had bestowed on him;

  Herself the solitary scion left

  Of a time-honoured race. -It was a name

  Which pleased him, and yet pleased him not -and why?

  Time taught him a deep answer -when she loved

  Another; even now she loved another,

  And on the summit of that hill she stood

  Looking afar if yet her lover’s steed

  Kept pace with her expectancy, and flew.

  III

  A change came o’er the spirit of my dream.

  There was an ancient mansion, and before

  Its walls there was a steed caparisoned:

  Within an antique Oratory stood

  The Boy of whom I spake; -he was alone,

  And pale, and pacing to and fro: anon

  He sate him down, and seized a pen, and traced

  Words which I could not guess of; then he leaned

  His bowed head on his hands and shook, as ‘twere

  With a convulsion -then rose again,

  And with his teeth and quivering hands did tear

  What he had written, but he shed no tears.

  And he did calm himself, and fix his brow

  Into a kind of quiet: as he paused,

  The Lady of his love re-entered there;

  She was serene and smiling then, and yet

  She knew she was by him beloved; she knew –

  For quickly comes such knowledge -that his heart

  Was darkened with her shadow, and she saw

  That he was wretched, but she saw not all.

  He rose, and with a cold and gentle grasp

  He took her hand; a moment o’er his face

  A tablet of unutterable thoughts

  Was traced, and then it faded, as it came;

  He dropped the hand he held, and with slow steps

  Retired, but not as bidding her adieu,

  For they did part with mutual smiles; he passed

  From out the massy gate of that old Hall,

  And mounting on his steed he went his way;

  And ne’er repassed that hoary threshold more.

  IV

  A change came o’er the spirit of my dream.

  The Boy was sprung to manhood: in the wilds

  Of fiery climes he made himself a home,

  And his Soul drank their sunbeams; he was girt

  With strange and dusky aspects; he was not

  Himself like what he had been; on the sea

  And on the shore he was a wanderer;

  There was a mass of many images

  Crowded like waves upon me, but he was

  A part of all; and in the last he lay

  Reposing from the noontide sultriness,

  Couched among fallen columns, in the shade

  Of ruined walls that had survived the names

  Of those who reared them; by his sleeping side

  Stood camels grazing, and some goodly steeds

  Were fastened near a fountain; and a man,

  Glad in a flowing garb, did watch the while,

  While many of his tribe slumbered around:

  And they were canopied by the blue sky,

  So cloudless, clear, and purely beautiful,

  That God alone was to be seen in heaven.

  V

  A change came o’er the spirit of my dream.

  The Lady of his love was wed with One

  Who did not love her better: in her home,

  A thousand leagues from his, -her native home,

  She dwelt, begirt with growing Infancy,

  Daughters and sons of Beauty, -but behold!

  Upon her face there was a tint of grief,

  The settled shadow of an inward strife,

  And an unquiet drooping of the eye,

  As if its lid were charged with unshed tears.

  What could her grief be? -she had all she loved,

  And he who had so loved her was not there

  To trouble with bad hopes, or evil wish,

  Or ill-repressed affliction, her pure thoughts.

  What could her grief be? -she had loved him not,

  Nor given him cause to deem himself beloved,

  Nor could he be a part of that which preyed

  Upon her mind -a spectre of the past.

  VI

  A change came o’er the spirit of my dream.

  The Wanderer was returned. -I saw him stand

  Before an altar -with a gentle bride;

  Her face was fair, but was not that which made

  The Starlight of his Boyhood; -as he stood

  Even at the altar, o’er his brow there came

  The selfsame aspect and the quivering shock

  That in the antique Oratory shook

  His bosom in its solitude; and then –

  As in that hour -a moment o’er his face

  The tablet of unutterable thoughts

  Was traced -and then it faded as it came,

  And he stood calm and quiet, and he spoke

  The fitting vows, but heard not his own words,

  And all things reeled around him; he could see

  Not that which was, nor that which should have been –

  But the old mansion, and the accustomed hall,

  And the remembered chambers, and the place,

  The day, the hour, the sunshine, and the shade,

  All things pertaining to that place and hour,

  And her who was his destiny, came back

  And thrust themselves between him and the light;

  What business had they there at such a time?

  VII

  A change came o’er the spirit of my dream.

  The Lady of his love; -Oh! she was changed,

  As by the sickness of the soul; her mind

  Had wandered from its dwelling, and her eyes,

  They had not their own lustre, but the look

  Which is not of the earth; she was become

  The queen of a fantastic realm; her thoughts

  Were combinations of disjointed things;

  And forms impalpable and unperceived

  Of others’ sight familiar were to hers.

  And this the world calls frenzy; but the wise

  Have a far deeper madness, and the glance

  Of melancholy is a fearful gift;

  What is it but the telescope of truth?

  Which strips the distance of its fantasies,

  And brings life near in utter nakedness,

  Making the cold reality too real!

  VIII

  A change came o’er the spirit of my dream.

  The Wanderer was alone as heretofore,

  The beings which surrounded him were gone,

  Or were at war with him; he was a mark

  For b
light and desolation, compassed round

  With Hatred and Contention; Pain was mixed

  In all which was served up to him, until,

  Like to the Pontic monarch of old days,

  He fed on poisons, and they had no power,

  But were a kind of nutriment; he lived

  Through that which had been death to many men,

  And made him friends of mountains; with the stars

  And the quick Spirit of the Universe

  He held his dialogues: and they did teach

  To him the magic of their mysteries;

  To him the book of Night was opened wide,

  And voices from the deep abyss revealed

  A marvel and a secret. -Be it so.

  IX

  My dream is past; it had no further change.

  It was of a strange order, that the doom

  Of these two creatures should be thus traced out

  Almost like a reality -the one

  To end in madness -both in misery.

  Lines On Hearing That Lady Byron Was Ill

  And thou wert sad – yet I was not with thee;

  And thou wert sick, and yet I was not near;

  Methought that joy and health alone could be

  Where I was not – and pain and sorrow here!

  And is it thus?-it is as I foretold,

  And shall be more so; for the mind recoils

  Upon itself, and the wreck’d heart lies cold,

  While heaviness collects the shatter’d spoils.

  It is not in the storm nor in the strife

  We feel benumb’d, and wish to be no more,

  But in the after – silence on the shore.

  When all is lost, except a little life.

  I am too well avenged! – but ‘twas my right ;

  Whate’er my sins might be, thou wert not sent

  To be the Nemesis who should requite –

  Nor did Heaven choose so near an instrument.

  Mercy is for the merciful! – thou

  Hast been of such, ‘twill be accorded now.

  Thy nights are banish’d from the realms of sleep! –

  Yes! they may flatter thee, but thou shalt feel

  A hollow agony which will not heal,

  For thou art pillow’d on a curse too deep;

  Thou hast sown in my sorrow, and must reap

  The bitter harvest in a woe as real!

  I have had many foes, but none like thee;

  For ‘gainst the rest myself I could defend, And be avenged, or turn them into friend;

  But thou in safe implacability

  Hadst nought to dread – in thy own weakness shielded,

  And in my love, which hath but too much yielded,

  And spared, for thy sake, some I should not spare;

  And thus upon the world – trust in thy truth,

  And the wild fame of my ungovern’d youth –

  On things that were not, and on things that are –

 

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