Tuesday, February 14, 2006
Poem #9
For Valentine's Day, how could I post anyone else but Byron? Here's one of my favorites by Lord B.To Caroline (4)
Oh when shall the grave hide for ever my sorrow?
Oh when shall my soul wing her flight from this clay?
The present is hell, and the coming to-morrow
But brings, with new torture, the curse of to-day.
From my eye flows no tear, from my lips flow no curses
I blast not the fiends who have hurl'd me from bliss;
For poor is the soul which bewailing rehearses
Its querulous grief, when in anguish like this.
Was my eye, 'stead of tears, with red fury flakes bright'ning,
Would my lips breathe a flame which no stream could assuage
On our foes should my glance launch in vengeance its lightning,
With transport my tongue give loose to its rage.
But now tears and curses, alike unavailing,
Would add to the souls of our tyrants delight;
Could they view us our sad separation bewailing
Their merciless hearts would rejoice at the sight.
Yet still, though we bend with a feign'd resignation,
Life beams not for us with one ray that can cheer;
Love and hope upon earth bring no more consolation,
In the grave is our hope, for in life is our fear.
Oh! when, my adored, in the tomb will they place me,
Since, in life, love and friendship for ever are fled?
If again in the mansion of death I embrace thee,
Perhaps they will leave unmolested the dead.
===========
Now that is poetry. Byron has such lyricism. He takes what could be a trite subject and manages to form the most beautiful, sad song of lost love. I really get chills when I read this.
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About Me
- Kelli McBride
- Oklahoma
- ABD, Associate Professor of Language Arts & Humanities at an Oklahoma 2-year college; web site designer; devoted aunt to Lauren.
9 comments:
I guess it takes a day like Valentine's to make you REALLY appreciate such beautiful words. Thanks for sharing, Kelli!!
Thanks! Byron is simply meant for lovers. Tormented, passionate, feel like they won't ever be together lovers, but still romantic. ;-)
Okay, and he was about the hottest looking writer in English. Even if he had severe personal problems and was probably a complete jerk.
Nice.
Well, I just posted 2 comments -- one sort of long and posted them to the post below this one. So, if you go down one post you can read them. Maybe I'll do a copy/past.
I think I'm senile.
To heck with the copy/paste.
Here's one I wrote to my husband.
I'm not Byron, but...
Without You
Time passes slowly.
Out of sync with digital computations,
analogs and crystals,
and pendulums and ticks and tocks,
time is told by a Dali clock
that melts the hours into days,
the weeks to years,
until the rust and moss
confounds the gears
and slows the ticks and halts the tocks
until time stops
without you.
BETTY!!! This is fantastic!!!!!
What a great poem, Betty! Seriously.
Thanks guys!
I love writing poetry. You just can't make any money at it.
Unitl now, I never bothered with poetry. It was never something that "spoke" to me.
Probably because the only poetry I've ever read was required reading in school. That was my first and only exposure. Being forced to do something then anylize and take it apart makes it lose it's appeal. At least for me it did.
You may have changed my thoughts about that.
The first one you posted, I stopped after a bit,my eyes glazed over.
This one, however, is different. Perhaps because Byron is so warmly and romantically written about, well, except for Melanie Jacskson...in that one he's the living dead. Which is cool.
Anyway, thanks!!