464 A WET SHEET AND A FLOWING SEA A WET sheet and a flowing sea, A wind that follows fast And fills the white and rustling sail Away the good ship flies, and leaves O for a soft and gentle wind! But give to me the snoring breeze And white waves heaving high; There's tempest in yon hornéd moon, The wind is piping loud, my boys, The lightning flashes free While the hollow oak our palace is, Our heritage the sea. 465 GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON [1788-1824] YOUTH AND AGE THERE'S not a joy the world can give like that it takes away When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's dull decay; 'Tis not on youth's smooth cheek the blush alone, which fades so fast, But the tender bloom of heart is gone, ere youth itself be past. Then the few whose spirits float above the wreck of happi ness Are driven o'er the shoals of guilt, or ocean of excess: The magnet of their course is gone, or only points in vain The shore to which their shiver'd sail shall never stretch again. Then the mortal coldness of the soul like death itself comes down; It cannot feel for others' woes, it dare not dream its own; That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our tears, And though the eye may sparkle still, 'tis where the ice appears. Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth distract the breast, Through midnight hours that yield no more their former hope of rest; 'Tis but as ivy-leaves around the ruin'd turret wreathe, All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and gray beneath. O could I feel as I have felt, or be what I have been, scene, As springs in deserts found seem sweet, all brackish though they be, So midst the wither'd waste of life, those tears would flow to me! 466 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, And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, 467 ELEGY ON THYRZA AND thou art dead, as young and fair As aught of mortal birth; And forms so soft and charms so rare Though Earth received them in her bed, There is an eye which could not brook I will not ask where thou liest low There flowers or weeds at will may grow It is enough for me to prove That what I loved, and long must love To me there needs no stone to tell Yet did I love thee to the last, Who didst not change through all the past The love where Death has set his seal Nor falsehood disavow: And, what were worse, thou canst not see Or wrong, or change, or fault in me. The better days of life were ours; The worst can be but mine: The sun that cheers, the storm that lours, The silence of that dreamless sleep Nor need I to repine That all those charms have pass'd away I might have watch'd through long decay. The flower in ripen'd bloom unmatch'd And yet it were a greater grief Since earthly eye but ill can bear I know not if I could have borne The night that follow'd such a morn 468 Thy day without a cloud hath past, As stars that shoot along the sky As once I wept, if I could weep, My tears might well be shed And show that love, however vain, Yet how much less it were to gain, And more thy buried love endears WHEN WE TWO PARTED WHEN We two parted To sever for years, Pale grew thy cheek and cold, Colder thy kiss; Truly that hour foretold Sorrow to this! The dew of the morning |