To The Countess of Blessington
by George Gordon, Lord Byron


    1
  1.   You has ask’d for a verse;—the request
  2.      In a rhymer ’twere strange to deny;
  3.   But my Hippocrene was but my breast,
  4.      And my feelings (its fountain) are dry.

    2
  5.   Were I now as I was, I had sung
  6.      What Lawrence has painted so well;
  7.   But the strain would expire on my tongue,
  8.      And the theme is too soft for my shell.

    3
  9.   I am ashes where once I was fire,
  10.      And the bard in my bosom is dead;
  11.   What I loved I now merely admire,
  12.      And my heart is as grey as my head.

    4
  13.   My life is not dated by years—
  14.      There are moments which act as a plough;
  15.   And there is not a furrow appears
  16.      But is deep in my soul as my brow.

    5
  17.   Let the young and the brilliant aspire
  18.      To sing what I gaze on in vain;
  19.   For sorrow has torn from my lyre
  20.      The string which was worthy the strain.

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