"WHEN COLDNESS WRAPS THIS SUFFERING CLAY' WHEN coldness wraps this suffering clay, Ah! whither strays the immortal mind? It cannot die, it cannot stay, But leaves its darken'd dust behind. By steps each planet's heavenly way? Eternal, boundless, undecay'd, A thought unseen, but seeing all, Before Creation peopled earth, Its eye shall roll through chaos back; And where the furthest heaven had birth, The spirit trace its rising track. And where the future mars or makes, Above or Love, Hope, Hate, or Fear, An age shall fleet like earthly year, 20 31 O'er all, through all, its thought shall fly; A nameless and eternal thing, Forgetting what it was to die. SEAHAM, 1815. The fingers of a man; A solitary hand Along the letters ran, And traced them like a wand. The monarch saw, and shook, And bade no more rejoice; All bloodless wax'd his look, And tremulous his voice. 'Let the men of lore appear, The wisest of the earth, And expound the words of fear, Which mar our royal mirth.' Chaldea's seers are good, But here they have no skill; And the unknown letters stood Untold and awful still. And Babel's men of age Are wise and deep in lore; But now they were not sage, They saw but knew no more. A captive in the land, A stranger and a youth, His kingdom pass'd away, Is light and worthless clay; The Persian on his throne !' 'SUN OF THE SLEEPLESS' 20 30 40 ON THE DAY OF THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM 221 'WERE MY BOSOM AS FALSE AS THOU DEEM’ST IT TO BE’ WERE my bosom as false as thou deem'st it to be, I need not have wander'd from far Galilee; If the bad never triumph, then God is with thee ! If the slave only sin, thou art spotless and free! If the Exile on earth is an Outcast on high, Live on in thy faith, but in mine I will die. I have lost for that faith more than thou canst bestow, As the God who permits thee to prosper doth know; In his hand is my heart and my hope and in thine The land and the life which for him I resign. SEAHAM, 1815. HEROD'S LAMENT FOR MARIAMNE Он, Mariamne! now for thee The heart for which thou bled'st is bleeding; Revenge is lost in agony, And wild remorse to rage succeeding. Oh, Mariamne! where art thou? Thou canst not hear my bitter pleading: Áh! couldst thou thou wouldst pardon now, Though Heaven were to my prayer unheeding. And is she dead? — and did they dare But thou art cold, my murder'd love! And this dark heart is vainly craving For her who soars alone above, And leaves my soul unworthy saving. She's gone, who shared my diadem; She sunk, with her my joys entombing; I swept that flower from Judah's stem, Whose leaves for me alone were blooming; BY THE RIVERS OF BABYLON WE SAT DOWN AND WEPT WE sate down and wept by the waters Of Babel, and thought of the day While sadly we gazed on the river That triumph the stranger shall know ! May this right hand be wither'd for ever, Ere it string our high harp for the foe! On the willow that harp is suspended, Oh Salem! its sound should be free; And the hour when thy glories were ended But left me that token of thee: And ne'er shall its soft tones be blended With the voice of the spoiler by me! January 15, 1813. THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB THE Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, But through it there roll'd not the breath of his pride: And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf, And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf. And there lay the rider distorted and pale, With the dew on his brow and the rust on his mail; And the tents were all silent, the banners alone, The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown. And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal; And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword, Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord! SEAHAM, February 17, 1815. 'A SPIRIT PASS'D BEFORE ME' FROM JOB A SPIRIT pass'd before me: I beheld And his cohorts were gleaming in purple Deep sleep came down on every eye save and gold; And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee. Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green, That host with their banners at sunset were seen: Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown, That host on the morrow lay wither'd and strown. For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast, And breathed in the face of the foe as he pass'd; And the eyes of the sleepers wax'd deadly and chill, And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still! mine And there it stood, all formless - but divine: 'Having been officiously taken up by a person who arrogated to himself some self-importance in criticism, and who made an observation upon their demerits, Lord Byron quaintly observed, "They were written in haste, and they shall perish in the same manner!" and immediately consigned them to the flames. As my music adapted to them, however, did not share the same fate, and having a contrary opinion of anything that might fall from the pen of his Lordship, I treasured them up, and on a subsequent interview with his Lordship, I accused him of having committed suicide in making so valuable a burnt-offering: to which he smilingly replied, "The act seems to inflame you; come, Nathan, since you are displeased with the sacrifice, I will give them to you as a peace-offering, use them as you may deem proper."'] THEY say that Hope is happiness; But genuine Love must prize the past, And Memory wakes the thoughts that bless; They rose the first- they set the last. And all that Memory loves the most Was once our only Hope to be, And all that Hope adored and lost Hath melted into Memory. Alas! it is delusion all; The future cheats us from afar, Nor can we be what we recall, Nor dare we think on what we are. EPHEMERAL VERSES [These squibs, bits of satire, and broken rhymes are taken chiefly from Byron's Letters. None of the verses were published in any edition of his poems during the author's life. The titles and dates here given indicate the letters from which the verses are taken, when no other source is indicated.] The chicken's toughness, and the lack of ale, The impending vermin, and the threaten'd That ever breaking Bed, beyond repair! The hat too old, the coat too cold to wear, 20 The Hunger, which repulsed from Sally's door Pursues her grumbling half from shore to shore, Be these the themes to greet his faithful Rib, So may thy pen be smooth, thy tongue be glib! This duty done, let me in turn demand |