I speak not--I trace not--I breathe not thy name,
There is grief in the sound--there were guilt in the fame,
But the tear which now burns on my cheek may impart
The deep thought that dwells in that silence of heart.
Too brief for our passion, too long for our peace,
Where those hours can their joy or their bitterness cease,
We repent--we abjure--we will break from our chain,
We must part--we must fly to--unite it again.
Oh! thine be the gladness and mine be the guilt,
Forgive me adored one--forsake if thou wilt,
But the heart which I bear shall expire undebased,
And man shall not break it--whatever thou mayest.
And stern to the haughty--but humble to thee,
My soul in its bitterest blackness shall be;
And our days seem as swift--and our moments more sweet
With thee by my side--than the world at our feet.
One sigh of thy sorrow--one look of thy love
Shall turn me or fix, shall reward or reprove;
And the heartless may wonder at all we resign,
Thy lip shall reply not to them--but to mine.
Many of the best poetical pieces of Lord Byron, having the least
amatory feeling, have been strangely distorted by his calumniators, as
if applicable to the lamented circumstances of his latter life.
The foregoing verses were written more than two years previously to
his marriage; and to show how averse his lordship was from touching in
the most distant manner upon the _theme_ which might be deemed to have
a personal allusion, he requested me the morning before he last left
London, either to suppress the verses entirely or to be careful in
putting the date when they were originally written.
At the close of his lordship's injunction, Mr. Leigh Hunt was
announced, to whom I was for the first time introduced, and at his
request I sang "O Marianne," and this melody, both of which he was
pleased to eulogize; but his lordship again observed, "Notwithstanding
my own partiality to the air, and the encomiums of an excellent judge,
yet I must adhere to my former injunction."
Observing his lordship's anxiety, and fully appreciating the noble
feeling by which that anxiety was augmented, I acquiesced, in
signifying my willingness to withhold the melody altogether from the
public rather than submit him to any uneasiness. "No, Nathan,"
ejaculated his lordship, "I am too great an admirer of your music to
suffer a single _phrase_ of it to be lost; I insist that you publish
the melody, but by attaching to it the date it will answer every
purpose, and it will prevent my lying under greater obligations than
are absolutely necessary for the _liberal encomiums_ of my _friends_."