The Works of Lord Byron Volume I Part 77

_A Love Song. To----.

[Imit. and Transl., p. 197.]

[Footnote ii:

_Remind me not, remind me not_.

[MS. L.] ]

[Footnote iii:

_Must still_.

[MS. L.] ]

TO A YOUTHFUL FRIEND. [i]

1.

Few years have pa.s.s'd since thou and I Were firmest friends, at least in name, And Childhood's gay sincerity Preserved our feelings long the same. [ii]

2.

But now, like me, too well thou know'st [iii]

What trifles oft the heart recall; And those who once have loved the most Too soon forget they lov'd at all. [iv]

3.

And such the change the heart displays, So frail is early friendship's reign, [v]

A month's brief lapse, perhaps a day's, Will view thy mind estrang'd again. [vi]

4.

If so, it never shall be mine To mourn the loss of such a heart; The fault was Nature's fault, not thine, Which made thee fickle as thou art.

5.

As rolls the Ocean's changing tide, So human feelings ebb and flow; And who would in a breast confide Where stormy pa.s.sions ever glow?

6.

It boots not that, together bred, Our childish days were days of joy: My spring of life has quickly fled; Thou, too, hast ceas'd to be a boy.

7.

And when we bid adieu to youth, Slaves to the specious World's controul, We sigh a long farewell to truth; That World corrupts the n.o.blest soul.

8.

Ah, joyous season! when the mind [1]

Dares all things boldly but to lie; When Thought ere spoke is unconfin'd, And sparkles in the placid eye.

9.

Not so in Man's maturer years, When Man himself is but a tool; When Interest sways our hopes and fears, And all must love and hate by rule.

10.

With fools in kindred vice the same, [vii]

We learn at length our faults to blend; And those, and those alone, may claim The prost.i.tuted name of friend.

11.

Such is the common lot of man: Can we then 'scape from folly free?