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Title: Stanzas: Written At Tunbbridge Wells
Author: J. C. Manning [
More Titles by Manning]
WRITTEN AT TUNBBRIDGE WELLS IN 1854, AFTER HAVING
SEEN LADY NOEL BYRON, WIDOW OF THE POET,
LORD BYRON, WHO WAS STAYING THERE
FOR THE BENEFIT OF HER HEALTH.
Like the Moon that is waning, thou movest along--
Silent, pensive, and pale--through thy sorrow's dark Night;
For thou draw'st from the rays of our bright Sun of Song
The white coldness that lives where reflected 's the light.
And the stars which in fancy around thee I see,
As in bright golden fire they eternally shine,
Seem to cast from their splendour a lustre on thee,
As of light from thy husband's effusions divine.
In the flush of his fame were thy virtues unseen,
By his blinding effulgence of genius hid:
Could he now see thy face, with its sorrow serene,
Much might he unsay--undo much that he did,
For I see in that face all the sorrows he told--
All the sadness he meant in his marvellous lore;
And the shadows of Memory, silent and old,
Seem to come with the light from Eternity's shore.
And I feel, though the world said his spirit and thine
Were as wide as the sun and the moon are apart,
That the beams of his love o'er thy bosom still shine--
That the thought of his passion still nurtures thy heart.
[The end]
J. C. Manning's poem: Stanzas: Written At Tunbbridge Wells
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