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Stanzas For Music, There's Not a Joy the World Can Give by Lord
George Gordon Byron |
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There's not a joy the world can
give like that it takes away
When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's
dull decay;
'Tis not on youth's smooth cheek the blush alone, which
fades so fast,
But the tender bloom of heart is gone, ere youth itself
be past.
Then the few whose spirits float above the wreck of
happiness
Are driven o'er the shoals of guilt, or ocean of excess:
The magnet of their course is gone, or only points in
vain
The shore to which their shivered sail shall never
stretch again.
Then the mortal coldness of the soul like death itself
comes down;
It cannot feel for others' woes, it dare not dream its
own;
That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our
tears,
And though the eye may sparkle still, 'tis where the ice
appears.
Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth
distract the breast,
Through midnight hours that yield no more their former
hope of rest,
'Tis but as ivy-leaves around the ruined turret wreath -
All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and grey
beneath.
Oh, could I feel as I have felt, or be what I have been,
Or weep as I could once have wept, o'er many a vanished
scene;
As springs in deserts found seem sweet, all brackish
though they be,
So, midst the withered waste of life, those tears would
flow to me.
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