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By Lord Byron
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When Friendship or Love
Our sympathies move;
When Truth in a glance, should appear,
The lips may beguile,
With a dimple or smile,
But the test of affection's a tear.
Too oft is a smile
But the hypocrite's wile,
To mask detestation, or fear;
Give me the soft sigh,
Whilst the soul-telling eye
Is dimm'd for a while, with a tear.
Mild Charity's glow,
To us mortals below,
Shows the soul from barbarity clear;
Compassion will melt,
Where this virtue is felt,
And its dew is diffused in a tear.
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The man, doom'd to sail
With the blast of the gale,
Through billows Atlantic to steer,
As he bends o'er the wave,
Which may soon be his grave,
The green sparkles bright with a tear.
The soldier braves death,
For a fanciful wreath,
In glory's romantic career;
But he raises the foe,
When in battle laid low,
And bathes every wound with a tear.
If, with high-bounding pride,
He returns to his bride,
Renouncing the gore-criminsoned spear;
All his toils are repaid
When embracing his maid
From her eyelids he kisses the tear.
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Sweet scene of my youth,
Seat of friendship and truth
Where love chased each fast-fleeting year;
Loth to leave thee I mourn'd;
For a last look I turn'd,
But thy spire was scarce seen through a tear.
Though my vows I can pour
To my Mary no more,
My Mary, to love once so dear;
In the shade of her bower,
I remember the hour,
She rewarded those vows with a tear.
By another possest
May she live ever blest,
Her name still my heart must revere;
With a sigh I resign
What I once thought was mine,
And forgive her deceit with a tear.
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Ye friends of my heart,
Ere from you I depart,
This hope to my breast is most near:
If again we shall meet
In this rural retreat
May we meet, as we part with a tear.
When my soul wings her flight
To the regions of night,
And my corse shall recline on its bier;
As ye pass by the tomb
Where my ashes consume,
Oh! moisten their dust with a tear.
May no marble bestow
The splendour of woe
Which the children of vanity rear;
No fiction of fame
Shall blazon my name.
All I ask, all I wish, is a tear.
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View in Jane's Manuscript Book
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