Category Lord Byron

When Dryden’s fool, ‘unknowing what he sought,’His hours in whistling spent, ‘for want of thought,’This guiltless oaf his vacancy of senseSupplied, and amply too, by innocenceDid modern swains, possess’d of Cymon’s powers,In Cymon’s manner waste their leisure hours,Th’ offended guests…

Absent or present, still to thee,My friend, what magic spells belong!As all can tell, who share, like me,In turn thy converse and thy song. But when the dreaded hour shall comeBy Friendship ever deem’d too nigh,And memory o’er her Druid’s…

Half stolen, with acknowledgments, to be spoken in an inarticulate voice by Master —— at the opening of the next new theatre. [Stolen parts marked with the inverted commas of quotation—thus “——”.] “When energising objects men pursue,”Then Lord knows what is…

In one dread night our city saw, and sigh’d,Bow’d to the dust, the Drama’s tower of prideIn one short hour beheld the blazing fane,Apollo sink, and Shakspeare cease to reign. Ye who beheld, (oh! sight admired and mourn’d,Whose radiance mock’d…

The chain I gave was fair to view,The lute I added sweet in sound;The heart that offer’d both was true,And ill deserved the fate it found.These gifts were charm’d by secret spell,Thy truth in absence to divine;And they have done…

Ill-fated Heart! And can it be,That thou should’st thus be rent in vain?Have years of care for thine and theeAlike been all employ’d in vain? Yet precious seems each shatter’d partAnd every fragment dearer grownSince he who wears thee feels…

If sometimes in the haunts of menThine image from my breast may fade,The lonely hour presents againThe semblance of thy gentle shade:And now that sad and silent hourThus much of thee can still restore,And sorrow unobserved may pourThe plaint she…

Weep, daughter of a royal line,A Sire’s disgrace, a realm’s decay;Ah, happy! if each tear of thineCould wash a father’s fault away! Weep—for thy tears are Virtue’s tears—Auspicious to these suffering isles;And be each drop in future yearsRepaid thee by…

And thou art dead, as young and fairAs aught of mortal birth;And form so soft, and charms so rare,Too soon return’d to Earth!Though Earth received them in her bedAnd o’er the spot the crowd may treadIn carelessness or mirth,There is…

When Time, or soon or late, shall bringThe dreamless sleep that lulls the dead,Oblivion! may thy languid wingWave gently o’er my dying bed! No band of friends or heirs be there,To weep, or wish, the coming blow:No maiden, with dishevelled…