Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 3.djvu/67

Rh 2. Then bring me wine, the banquet bring;

Man was not formed to live alone;

I'll be that light unmeaning thing

That smiles with all, and weeps with none.

It was not thus in days more dear,

It never would have been, but thou

Hast fled, and left me lonely here;

Thou'rt nothing,—all are nothing now.

3. In vain my lyre would lightly breathe!

The smile that Sorrow fain would wear

But mocks the woe that lurks beneath,

Like roses o'er a sepulchre.

Though gay companions o'er the bowl

Dispel awhile the sense of ill;

Though Pleasure fires the maddening soul,

The Heart,—the Heart is lonely still!

4. On many a lone and lovely night

It soothed to gaze upon the sky;

For then I deemed the heavenly light

Shone sweetly on thy pensive eye:

And oft I thought at Cynthia's noon,

When sailing o'er the Ægean wave,

"Now Thyrza gazes on that moon"—

Alas, it gleamed upon her grave!

5.

When stretched on Fever's sleepless bed,

And sickness shrunk my throbbing veins, Variants