And Thou Art Dead, As Young And Fair[aq]
"Heu, quanto minus est cum reliquis versari quam tui meminisse!"[34]
1.
And thou art dead, as young and fair
As aught of mortal birth;
And form so soft, and charms so rare,
Too soon returned to Earth![ar]
Though Earth received them in her bed,
And o'er the spot the crowd may tread[as]
In carelessness or mirth,
There is an eye which could not brook
A moment on that grave to look.
2.
I will not ask where thou liest low,[at]
Nor gaze upon the spot;
There flowers or weeds at will may grow,
So I behold them not:[au]
It is enough for me to prove
That what I loved, and long must love,
Like common earth can rot;[av]
To me there needs no stone to tell,
'Tis Nothing that I loved so well[aw]
3.
Yet did I love thee to the last
As fervently as thou,[ax]
Who didst not change through all the past,
And canst not alter now.
The love where Death has set his seal,
Nor age can chill, nor rival steal,[ay]
Nor falsehood disavow:[az]
And, what were worse, thou canst not see[ba]
Or wrong, or change, or fault in me.[bb]
4.
The better days of life were ours;
The worst can be but mine:
The sun that cheers, the storm that lowers,[bc]
Shall never more be thine.
The silence of that dreamless sleep[bd]
I envy now too much to weep;
Nor need I to repine,
That all those charms have passed away
I might have watched through long decay.
5.
The flower in ripened bloom unmatched
Must fall the earliest prey;[be]
Though by no hand untimely snatched,
The leaves must drop away:
And yet it were a greater grief
To watch it withering, leaf by leaf,
Than see it plucked to-day;
Since earthly eye but ill can bear
To trace the change to foul from fair.
6.
I know not if I could have borne[bf]
To see thy beauties fade;
The night that followed such a morn
Had worn a deeper shade:
Thy day without a cloud hath passed,[bg]
And thou wert lovely to the last;
Extinguished, not decayed;
As stars that shoot along the sky[bh]
Shine brightest as they fall from high.
7.
As once I wept, if I could weep,
My tears might well be shed,
To think I was not near to keep
One vigil o'er thy bed;
To gaze, how fondly! on thy face,
To fold thee in a faint embrace,
Uphold thy drooping head;
And show that love, however vain,
Nor thou nor I can feel again.
8.
Yet how much less it were to gain,
Though thou hast left me free,[bi]
The loveliest things that still remain,
Than thus remember thee!
The all of thine that cannot die
Through dark and dread Eternity[bj]
Returns again to me,
And more thy buried love endears
Than aught, except its living years.
February, 1812.
[First published, Childe Harold, 1812 (Second Edition).]
Footnotes
[aq] {41} Stanzas.—[Editions 1812-1831.]
[34] ["The Lovers' Walk is terminated with an ornamental urn, inscribed to Miss Dolman, a beautiful and amiable relation of Mr. Shenstone's, who died of the small-pox, about twenty-one years of age, in the following words on one side:—
'Peramabili consobrinæ
M.D.'
On the other side—
'Ah! Maria!
pvellarvm elegantissima!
ah Flore venvstatis abrepta,vale!
hev qvanto minvs est
cvm reliqvis versari
qvam tui
meminisse.'"
(From a Description of the Leasowes, by A. Dodsley; Poetical Works of William Shenstone [1798], p. xxix.)]
[ar]Are mingled with the Earth.—[MS.]
Were never meant for Earth.—[MS. erased.]
[as] Unhonoured with the vulgar dread.—[MS. erased.]
[at] {42}I will not ask where thou art laid,
Nor look upon the name.—[MS. erased.]
[au] So I shall know it not.—[MS. erased.]
[av] Like common dust can rot.—[MS.]
[aw] I would not wish to see nor touch.—[MS. erased.]
[ax] As well as warm as thou.—[MS. erased.]
[ay] MS. transposes lines 5 and 6 of stanza 3.
[az] Nor frailty disavow.—[MS.]
[ba] Nor canst thou fair and faultless see.—[MS. erased.]
[bb] Nor wrong, nor change, nor fault in me.—[MS.]
[bc] {43} The cloud that cheers——.—[MS.]
[bd] The sweetness of that silent deep.—[MS.]
[be]The flower in beauty's bloom unmatched
Is still the earliest prey.—[MS.]
The rose by some rude fingers snatched,
Is earliest doomed to fade.—[MS. erased.]
[bf] I do not deem I could have borne.—[MS.]
[bg]But night and day of thine are passed,
And thou wert lovely to the last;
Destroyed——.—[MS. erased.]
[bh] {44} As stars that seem to quit the sky.—[MS.]
[bi]O how much less it were to gain,
All beauteous though they be.—[MS.]
[bj] Through dark and dull Eternity.—[MS.]
