Lord Byron
1788-1824
Occasional Pieces
WRITTEN UNDER THE IMPRESSION THAT THE AUTHOR WOULD SOON DIE
ADIEU, thou
Hill! where early joy
Spread roses o'er my brow;
Where Science seeks each loitering boy
With knowledge to endow.
Adieu, my youthful friends or foes,
Partners of former bliss or woes;
No more through Ida's paths we stray;
Soon must I share the gloomy cell,
Whose ever‑slumbering inmates dwell
Unconscious of the day.
Adieu, ye
hoary Regal Fanes,
Ye spires of Granta's vale,
Where Learning robed in sable reigns,
And Melancholy pale.
Ye comrades of the jovial hour,
Ye tenants of the classic bower,
On Cama's verdant margin placed,
Adieu! while memory still is mine,
For, offerings on Oblivion's shrine,
These scenes must be effaced.
Adieu, ye
mountains of the clime
Where grew my youthful years;
Where Loch na Garr in snows sublime
His giant summit rears.
Why did my childhood wander forth
From you, ye regions of the North,
With sons of pride to roam?
Why did I quit my Highland cave,
Mar's dusky heath, and Dee's clear wave,
To seek a Sotheron home!
Hall of
my Sires! a long farewell -
Yet why to thee adieu?
Thy vaults will echo back my knell,
Thy towers my tomb will view:
The faltering tongue which sung thy fall,
And former glories of thy Hall,
Forgets its wonted simple note -
But yet the Lyre retains the strings,
And sometimes, on Æolian wings,
In dying strains may float.
Fields which
surround yon rustic cot,
While yet I linger here,
Adieu! you are not now forgot,
To retrospection dear.
Streamlet! along whose rippling surge
My youthful limbs were wont to urge,
At noontide heat, their pliant course;
Plunging with ardour from the shore,
Thy springs will lave these limbs no more,
Deprived of active force.
And shall
I here forget the scene,
Still nearest to my breast?
Rocks rise and rivers roll between
The spot which passion blest;
Yet, Mary, all thy beauties seem
Fresh as in Love's bewitching dream,
To me in smiles display'd;
Till slow disease resigns his prey
To Death, the parent of decay,
Thine image cannot fade.
And thou,
my Friend! whose gentle love
Yet thrills my bosom's chords,
How much thy friendship was above
Description's power of words!
Still near my breast thy gift I wear
Which sparkled once with Feeling's tear,
Of Love the pure, the sacred gem;
Our souls were equal, and our lot
In that dear moment quite forgot;
Let Pride alone condemn!
All, all
is dark and cheerless now!
No smile of Love's deceit
Can warm my veins with wonted glow,
Can bid Life's pulses beat:
Not e'en the hope of future fame
Can wake my faint, exhausted frame,
Or crown with fancied wreaths my head.
Mine is a short inglorious race,-
To humble in the dust my face,
And mingle with the dead.
Oh Fame!
thou goddess of my heart;
On him who gains thy praise,
Pointless must fall the Spectre's dart,
Consumed in Glory's blaze;
But me she beckons from the earth,
My name obscure, unmark'd my birth,
My life a short and vulgar dream:
Lost in the dull, ignoble crowd,
My hopes recline within a shroud,
My fate is Lathe's stream.
When I repose
beneath the sod,
Unheeded in the clay,
Where once my playful footsteps trod,
Where now my head must lay,
The weed of Pity will be shed
In dew-drops o'er my narrow bed,
By nightly skies, and storms alone;
No mortal eye will deign to steep
With tears the dark sepulchral deep
Which hides a name unknown.
Forget this
world, my restless sprite,
Turn, turn thy thoughts to Heaven:
There must thou soon direct thy flight,
If errors are forgiven.
To bigots and to sects unknown,
Bow down beneath the Almighty's Throne;
To Him address thy trembling prayer:
He, who is merciful and just,
Will not reject a child of dust,
Although his meanest care.
Father of
Light! to Thee I call;
My soul is dark within:
Thou who canst mark the sparrow's fall,
Avert the death of sin.
Thou, who canst guide the wandering star,
Who calm'st the elemental war,
Whose mantle is yon boundless sky,
My thoughts, my words, my crimes forgive:
And, since I soon must cease to live,
Instruct me how to die.
1807 [First published, 1832.]
AH! heedless
girl! why thus disclose
What ne'er was meant for other ears:
Why thus destroy thine own repose
And dig the source of future tears?
Oh,
thou wilt weep, imprudent maid,
While lurking envious foes will smile,
For all the follies thou hast said
Of those who spoke but to beguile.
Vain girl!
thy ling'ring woes are nigh,
If thou believ'st what striplings say:
Oh, from the deep temptation fly,
Nor fall the specious spoiler's prey.
Dost thou
repeat, in childish boast,
The words man utters to deceive?
Thy peace, thy hope, thy all is lost,
If thou canst venture to believe.
While now
amongst thy female peers
Thou tell'st again the soothing tale,
Canst thou not mark the rising sneers
Duplicity in vain would veil?
These tales
in secret silence hush,
Nor make thyself the public gaze:
What modest maid without a blush
Recounts a flattering coxcomb's praise?
Will not
the laughing boy despise
Her who relates each fond conceit -
Who, thinking Heaven is in her eyes,
Yet cannot see the slight deceit?
For she
who takes a soft delight
These amorous nothings in revealing,
Must credit all we say or write,
While vanity prevents concealing.
Cease, if
you prize your beauty's reign!
No jealousy bids me reprove:
One, who is thus from nature vain,
I pity, but I cannot love.
January 15,1807.
[First published, 1832.]
OH,
Anne, your offences to me have been grievous:
I thought from my wrath no atonement could save you:
But woman is made to command and deceive us —
I look 'd in your face, and I almost forgave you.
I vow'd
I could ne'er for a moment respect you,
Yet thought that a day's separation was long;
When we met, I determined again to suspect you
Your smile soon convinced me suspicion was wrong.
I
swore, in a transport of young indignation,
With fervent contempt evermore to disdain you:
I saw you - my anger became admiration;
And now, all my wish, all my hope's to regain you.
With
beauty like yours, oh, how vain the contention!
Thus lowly I sue for forgiveness before you;
At once to conclude such a fruitless dissension,
Be false, my sweet Anne, when I cease to adore you!
January 16, 1807.
[First published, 1832.]
OH,
say not, sweet Anne, that the Fates have decreed
The heart which adores you should wish to dissever;
Such Fates were to me most unkind ones indeed,
To bear me from love and from beauty for ever.
Your frowns,
lovely girl, are the Fates which alone
Could bid me from fond admiration refrain;
By these, every hope, every wish were o'erthrown,
Till smiles should restore me to rapture again.
As
the ivy and oak, in the forest entwined,
The rage of the tempest united must weather;
My love and my life were by nature design'd
To flourish alike, or to perish together.
Then
say not, sweet Anne, that the Fates have decreed
Your lover should bid you a lasting adieu;
Till Fate can ordain that his bosom shall bleed,
His soul, his existence, are centred in you.
1807 [First published, 1832]
BEGINNING ' " SAD IS MY VERSE," YOU SAY, "AND YET NO TEAR"'
Thy verse
is 'sad' enough, no doubt:
A devilish deal more sad than witty!
Why we should weep I can't find out,
Unless for thee we weep in pity.
Yet there
is one I pity more;
And much, alas! I think he needs it;
For he, I'm sure, will suffer sore,
Who, to his own misfortune, reads it.
Thy rhymes,
without the aid of magic,
May once be read - but never after:
Yet their effect's by no means tragic,
Although by far too dull for laughter.
But would
you make our bosoms bleed,
And of no common pang complain -
If you would make us weep indeed,
Tell us, you'll read them o'er again.
March 8, 1807[First published, 1832.]
ON
FINDING A FANIN one who
felt as once he felt
This might, perhaps, have fann'd the flame;
But now his heart no more will melt,
Because that heart is not the same.
As when
the ebbing flames are low,
The aid which once improved their light,
And bade them burn with fiercer glow,
Now quenches all their blaze in night.
Thus has
it been with passion's fires-
As many a boy and girl remembers
While every hope of love expires,
Extinguish'd with the dying embers.
The first,
though not a spark survive,
Some careful hand may teach to barn;
The last, alas l can ne'er survive;
No touch can bid its warmth reform
Or, if it
chance to wake again.
Not always doom 'd its heat to smother,
It sheds (so wayward fates ordain)
Its former warmth around another. 1807.
[First published, 1832.]
THOU
Power! who hast ruled me through infancy's days,
Young offspring of fancy, 'tis time we should part;
Then rise on the gale this the last of any lays,
The coldest effusion which springs from my heart.
This bosom,
responsive to rapture no more,
Shall hush thy wild notes, nor implore thee to sing;
The feelings of childhood, which taught thee to soar,
Are wafted far distant on Apathy's wing.
Though simple
the themes of my rude flowing Lyre,
Yet even these themes are departed forever;
No more beam the eyes which my dream could inspire,
My visions are flown, to return, - alas never
When drain'd
is the nectar which gladdens the bowl,
How vain is the effort delight to prolong!
When cold is the beauty which dwelt in my soul,
What magic of Fancy can lengthen my song?
Can the
lips sing of Love in the desert alone,
Of kisses and smiles which they now must resign?
Or dwell with delight on the hours that are flown?
Ah, no! for those hours can no longer be mine.
Can they
speak of the friends that I lived but to love?
Ah, surely affection ennobles the strains
But how can my numbers in sympathy move
When I scarcely can hope to behold them again?
Can I sing
of the deeds which my Fathers have done,
And raise my loud harp to the fame of any Sires?
For glories, like theirs, oh, how faint is my tone!
For Heroes' exploits how unequal my fires!
Untouch'd,
then, my Lyre shall reply to the blast -
'Tis hush'd; and my feeble endeavours are o'er;
And those who have heard it will pardon the past,
When they know that its murmurs shall vibrate no more.
And soon
shall its wild erring notes be forgot,
Since early affection and love is o'ercast:
Oh! blest had my fate been, and happy my lot,
Had the first strain of love been the dearest, the last.
Farewell,
my young Muse! since we now can ne'er meet;
If our songs have been languid, they surely are few;
Let us hope that the present at least will be sweet
The present‑which seals our eternal Adieu.
1807. [First published, 1832.]
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