And oft by yon blue gushing stream Shall Sorrow lean her drooping head, And feed deep thought with many a dream, Fond wretch! as if her step disturb'd the dead! Away! we know that tears are vain, That death nor heeds nor hears distress: Will this unteach us to complain? Or make one mourner weep the less? And thou-who tell'st me to forget, IV. I SAW THEE WEEP. I SAW thee weep-the big bright tear I saw thee smile-the sapphire's blaze It could not match the living rays As clouds from yonder sun receive Which scarce the shade of coming eve Can banish from the sky, Those smiles unto the moodiest mind Their own pure joy impart ; Their sunshine leaves a glow behind That lightens o'er the heart. V. THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB. THE Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green, For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast, And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, And there lay the rider distorted and pale, With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail; And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, PROMETHEUS. 1816. LORD BYRON. I. ITAN! to whose immortal eyes Seen in their sad reality, Were not as things that gods despise; What was thy pity's recompense? A silent suffering, and intense; The rock, the vulture, and the chain, Which speaks but in its loneliness, And then is jealous lest the sky II. Titan! to thee the strife was given Between the suffering and the will, Which torture where they cannot kill; And the inexorable Heaven, And the deaf tyranny of Fate, The ruling principle of Hate, Which for its pleasure doth create The things it may annihilate, Refused thee even the boon to die: Was thine-and thou hast borne it well. The fate thou didst so well foresee, That in his hand the lightnings trembled. III. Thy Godlike crime was to be kind, The sum of human wretchedness, Still in thy patient energy, In the endurance, and repulse Of thine impenetrable Spirit, Which Earth and Heaven could not convulse, A mighty lesson we inherit: Thou art a symbol and a sign To Mortals of their fate and force; Like thee, Man is in part divine, A troubled stream from a pure source; His wretchedness, and his resistance, And a firm will, and a deep sense, CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 1809-1817. LORD BYRON. 1. TO INEZ. (Canto I., Stanza 84). NAY, smile not at my sullen brow; And dost thou ask what secret woe It is not love, it is not hate, Nor low Ambition's honours lost, It is that weariness which springs It is that settled, ceaseless gloom The fabled Hebrew wanderer bore ; That will not look beyond the tomb, But cannot hope for rest before. |