Poems on Travel Part 6

LORD BYRON.

AT VENICE

_On the Lido_

On her still lake the city sits While bark and boat beside her flits, Nor hears, her soft siesta taking, The Adriatic billows breaking.

_In the Piazza at night_

O beautiful beneath the magic moon 5 To walk the watery way of palaces; O beautiful, o'er-vaulted with gemmed blue This s.p.a.cious court; with colour and with gold, With cupolas, and pinnacles, and points, And crosses multiplex, and tips, and b.a.l.l.s, 10 (Wherewith the bright stars unreproving mix, Nor scorn by hasty eyes to be confused;) Fantastically perfect this lone pile Of oriental glory; these long ranges Of cla.s.sic chiselling; this gay flickering crowd, 15 And the calm Campanile.--Beautiful!

O beautiful!

A. H. CLOUGH.

FLORENCE

Arno wins us to the fair white walls, Where the Etrurian Athens claims and keeps A softer feeling for her fairy halls.

Girt by her theatre of hills, she reaps Her corn, and wine, and oil, and Plenty leaps 5 To laughing life, with her redundant horn.

Along the banks where smiling Arno sweeps Was modern Luxury of Commerce born, And buried Learning rose, redeemed to a new morn.

There, too, the G.o.ddess loves in stone, and fills 10 The air around with beauty; we inhale The ambrosial aspect, which, beheld, instils Part of its immortality; the veil Of heaven is half undrawn; within the pale We stand, and in that form and face behold 15 What Mind can make, when Nature's self would fail; And to the fond idolaters of old Envy the innate flash which such a soul could mould.

LORD BYRON.

AN INVITATION TO ROME

Oh, come to Rome, it is a pleasant place, Your London sun is here seen s.h.i.+ning brightly; The Briton, too, puts on a cheery face, And Mrs. Bull is suave and even sprightly.

The Romans are a kind and cordial race, 5 The women charming, if one takes them rightly; I see them at their doors, as day is closing, More proud than d.u.c.h.esses,--and more imposing.

A _far niente_ life promotes the graces; They pa.s.s from dreamy bliss to wakeful glee, 10 And in their bearing and their speech one traces A breadth of grace and depth of courtesy That are not found in more inclement places; Their clime and tongue seem much in harmony: The c.o.c.kney met in Middles.e.x, or Surrey, 15 Is often cold--and always in a hurry.

Though _far niente_ is their pa.s.sion, they Seem here most eloquent in things most slight; No matter what it is they have to say, The manner always sets the matter right: 20 And when they've plagued or pleased you all the day, They sweetly wish you 'a most happy night'.

Then, if they fib, and if their stories tease you, 'Tis always something that they've wished to please you!

Oh, come to Rome, nor be content to read 25 Alone of stately palaces and streets Whose fountains ever run with joyful speed, And never-ceasing murmur. Here one meets Great Memnon's monoliths, or, gay with weed, Rich capitals, as corner-stones, or seats, 30 The sites of vanished temples, where now moulder Old ruins, hiding ruin even older.

Ay, come, and see the pictures, statues, churches, Although the last are commonplace, or florid.-- Some say 'tis here that superst.i.tion perches, 35 Myself I'm glad the marbles have been quarried.

The sombre streets are worthy your researches: The ways are foul, the lava pavement's horrid, But pleasant sights, that squeamishness disparages, Are missed by all who roll about in carriages. 40

About one fane I deprecate all sneering, For during Christmas-time I went there daily, Amused, or edified, or both, by hearing The little preachers of the _Ara Coeli_.

Conceive a four-year-old _bambina_ rearing 45 Her small form on a rostrum,--tricked out gaily, And lisping, what for doctrine may be frightful, With action quite dramatic and delightful.

Oh come! We'll charter such a pair of nags!

The country's better seen when one is riding: 50 We'll roam where yellow Tiber speeds or lags At will. The aqueducts are yet bestriding With giant march (now whole, now broken crags With flowers plumed) the swelling and subsiding Campagna, girt by purple hills, afar,-- 55 That melt in light beneath the evening star.

A drive to Palestrina will be pleasant; The wild fig grows where erst her turrets stood; There oft, in goat-skins clad, a sunburnt peasant Like Pan comes frisking from his ilex wood, 60 And seems to wake the past time in the present.

Fair _contadina_, mark his mirthful mood, No antique satyr he. The nimble fellow Can join with jollity your _salterello_.

Old sylvan peace and liberty! The breath 65 Of life to unsophisticated man.

Here Mirth may pipe, here Love may weave his wreath, _Per dar' al mio bene._ When you can, Come share their leafy solitudes. Grim Death And Time are grudging of Life's little span: 70 Wan Time speeds lightly o'er the waving corn, Death grins from yonder cynical old thorn.

I dare not speak of Michael Angelo-- Such theme were all too splendid for my pen: And if I breathe the name of Sanzio 75 (The brightest of Italian gentlemen), It is that love casts out my fear, and so I claim with him a kindreds.h.i.+p. Ah, when We love, the name is on our hearts engraven, As is thy name, my own dear Bard of Avon! 80

Nor is the Coliseum theme of mine, 'Twas built for poet of a larger daring; The world goes there with torches, I decline Thus to affront the moonbeams with their flaring.

Some day in May our forces we'll combine 85 (Just you and I), and try a midnight airing, And then I'll quote this rhyme to you--and then You'll muse upon the vanity of men!

Oh, come! I send a leaf of tender fern, 'Twas plucked where Beauty lingers round decay: 90 The ashes buried in a sculptured urn Are not more dead than Rome--so dead to-day!

That better time, for which the patriots yearn, Enchants the gaze, again to fade away.

They wait and pine for what is long denied, 95 And thus I wait till thou art by my side.

Thou'rt far away! Yet, while I write, I still Seem gently, Sweet, to press thy hand in mine; I cannot bring myself to drop the quill, I cannot yet thy little hand resign! 100 The plain is fading into darkness chill, The Sabine peaks are flushed with light divine, I watch alone, my fond thought wings to thee; Oh, come to Rome--oh come, oh come to me!

F. LOCKER-LAMPSON.

THE COLISEUM

I do remember me, that in my youth, When I was wandering,--upon such a night I stood within the Coliseum's wall, 'Midst the chief relics of almighty Rome; The trees which grew along the broken arches 5 Waved dark in the blue midnight, and the stars Shone through the rents of ruin; from afar The watch-dog bayed beyond the Tiber; and More near from out the Caesar's palace came The owl's long cry, and, interruptedly, 10 Of distant sentinels the fitful song Begun and died upon the gentle wind.

Some cypresses beyond the time-worn breach Appeared to skirt the horizon, yet they stood Within a bowshot. Where the Caesars dwelt, 15 And dwell the tuneless birds of night, amidst A grove which springs through levelled battlements, And twines its roots with the imperial hearths, Ivy usurps the laurel's place of growth; But the gladiators' b.l.o.o.d.y Circus stands, 20 A n.o.ble wreck in ruinous perfection, While Caesar's chambers, and the Augustan halls, Grovel on earth in indistinct decay.

And thou didst s.h.i.+ne, thou rolling moon, upon All this, and cast a wide and tender light, 25 Which softened down the h.o.a.r austerity Of rugged desolation, and filled up, As 't were anew, the gaps of centuries; Leaving that beautiful which still was so, And making that which was not, till the place 30 Became religion, and the heart ran o'er With silent wors.h.i.+p of the great of old,-- The dead but sceptred sovereigns, who still rule Our spirits from their urns.

LORD BYRON.

AT ROME

Is this, ye G.o.ds, the Capitolian Hill?

Yon petty Steep in truth the fearful Rock, Tarpeian named of yore, and keeping still That name, a local Phantom proud to mock The Traveller's expectation?--Could our Will 5 Destroy the ideal Power within, 'twere done Thro' what men see and touch,--slaves wandering on, Impelled by thirst of all but Heaven-taught skill.

Full oft, our wish obtained, deeply we sigh; Yet not unrecompensed are they who learn, 10 From that depression raised, to mount on high With stronger wing, more clearly to discern Eternal things; and, if need be, defy Change, with a brow not insolent, though stern.

W. WORDSWORTH.

ROME

AT THE PYRAMID OF CESTIUS NEAR THE GRAVES OF Sh.e.l.lEY AND KEATS

Who, then, was Cestius, And what is he to me?-- Amid thick thoughts and memories mult.i.tudinous One thought alone brings he.

I can recall no word 5 Of anything he did; For me he is a man who died and was interred To leave a pyramid

Whose purpose was exprest Not with its first design, 10 Nor till, far down in Time, beside it found their rest Two countrymen of mine.

Cestius in life, maybe, Slew, breathed out threatening; I know not. This I know: in death all silently He does a rarer thing, 16

In beckoning pilgrim feet With marble finger high To where, by shadowy wall and history-haunted street, Those matchless singers lie.... 20