Her cheek grew wan and pale, Till she hid her faded loveliness Beneath the sacred veil. 70And she cut off her long dark hair, And bade the world farewell, And she now dwells a veiled nun In Saint Marie's cell. 1825 Love's Last Lesson 5IO15'Teach it me, if you can,?forgetfulness!1 I surely shall forget, if you can bid me; I who have worshipp'd thee, my god on earth, I who have bow'd me at thy lightest word. Your last command, 'Forget me,' will it not Sink deeply down within my inmost soul? Forget thee!?ay, forgetfulness will be A mercy to me. By the many nights When I have wept for that I dared not sleep,? A dream had made me live my woes again, Acting my wretchedness, without the hope My foolish heart still clings to, though that hope Is like the opiate which may lull a while, Then wake to double torture; by the days Pass'd in lone watching and in anxious fears, When a breath sent the crimson to my cheek, Like the red gushing of a sudden wound; By all the careless looks and careless words Which have to me been like the scorpion's stinging;
1. An allusion to Byron's Manfred 1.1.135-36: Other Byronic echoes in lines 14?15, 18?23, 85? 'What wouldst thou with us, son of mortals? 86, and 95-98 further link Landon's speaker to the say?'?to which Manfred replies, 'Forgetfulness.' protagonists of Childe Harold and Manfred.
.
97 4 / LETITIA ELIZABETH LANDON
20 By happiness blighted, and by thee, for ever; By thy eternal work of wretchedness; By all my wither'd feelings, ruin'd health, Crush'd hopes, and rifled heart, I will forget thee! Alas! my words are vanity. Forget thee!
25 Thy work of wasting is too surely done. The April shower may pass and be forgotten, The rose fall and one fresh spring in its place, And thus it may be with light summer love. It was not thus with mine: it did not spring,
30 Like the bright colour on an evening cloud, Into a moment's life, brief, beautiful; Not amid lighted halls, when flatteries Steal on the ear like dew upon the rose, As soft, as soon dispersed, as quickly pass'd;
35 But you first call'd my woman's feelings forth, And taught me love ere I had dream'd love's name. I loved unconsciously: your name was all That seem'd in language, and to me the world Was only made for you; in solitude,
40 When passions hold their interchange together, Your image was the shadow of my thought; Never did slave, before his Eastern lord, Tremble as I did when I met your eye, And yet each look was counted as a prize;
45 I laid your words up in my heart like pearls Hid in the ocean's treasure-cave. At last I learn'd my heart's deep secret: for I hoped, I dream'd you loved me; wonder, fear, delight, Swept my heart like a storm; my soul, my life,
50 Seem'd all too little for your happiness; Had I been mistress of the starry worlds That light the midnight, they had all been yours, And I had deem'd such boon but poverty. As it was, I gave all I could?my love,
55 My deep, my true, my fervent, faithful love; And now you bid me learn forgetfulness: It is a lesson that I soon shall learn. There is a home of quiet for the wretched, A somewhat dark, and cold, and silent rest,
60 But still it is rest,?for it is the grave.'
She flung aside the scroll, as it had part In her great misery. Why should she write? What could she write? Her woman's pride forbade To let him look upon her heart, and see
65 It was an utter ruin;?and cold words, And scorn and slight, that may repay his own, Were as a foreign language, to whose sound She might not frame her utterance. Down she bent Her head upon an arm so white that tears
70 Seem'd but the natural melting of its snow, Touch'd by the flush'd cheek's crimson; yet life-blood Less wrings in shedding than such tears as those.
.
LOVE' S LAST LESSO N / 97 5 And this then is love's ending! It is like The history of some fair southern clime. 75 Hot fires are in the bosom of the earth, And the warm'd soil puts forth its thousand flowers, Its fruits of gold, summer's regality, And sleep and odours float upon the air: At length the subterranean element so Breaks from its secret dwelling-place, and lays All waste before it; the red lava stream Sweeps like the pestilence; and that which was A garden in its colours and its breath, Fit for the princess of a fairy tale, 85 Is as a desert, in whose burning sands, And ashy waters, who is there can trace A sign, a memory of its former beauty? It is thus with the heart; love lights it up With hopes like young companions, and with joys 90 Dreaming deliciously of their sweet selves. This is at first; but what is the result? Hopes that lie mute in their own sullenness, For they have quarrel] d even with themselves; And joys indeed like birds of Paradise:2 95 And in their stead despair coils scorpion-like Stinging itself;3 and the heart, burnt and crush'd With passion's earthquake, scorch'd and wither'd up, Lies in its desolation,?this is love. What is the tale that I would tell? Not one IOO Of strange adventure, but a common tale Of woman's wretchedness; one to be read Daily in many a young and blighted heart. The lady whom I spake of rose again From the red fever's couch, to careless eyes 105 Perchance the same as she had ever been. But oh, how alter'd to herself! She felt That bird-like pining for some gentle home To which affection might attach itself, That weariness which hath but outward part i IO In what the world calls pleasure, and that chill Which makes life taste the bitterness of death. And he she loved so well,?what opiate Lull'd consciousness into its selfish sleep?? He said he loved her not; that never vow ii5 Or passionate pleading won her soul for him; And that he guess'd not her deep tenderness. Are words, then, only false? are there no looks, Mute but most eloquent; no gentle cares
2. In Eastern tales, the bird of Paradise never rests (1813), Byron had written of how 'The Mind, that on the earth [Landon's notel. broods o'er guilty woes, / Is like the Scorpion girt 3. In The Giaour: A Fragment of a Turkish Tale by fire' (lines 423-24).
.
97 6 / LETITI A ELIZABET H LANDO N That win so much upon the fair weak things 120 They seem to guard? And had he not long read Her heart's hush'd secret in the soft dark eye Lighted at his approach, and on the cheek Colouring all crimson at his lightest look? This is the truth; his spirit wholly turn'd 125 To stern ambition's dream, to that fierce strife Which leads to life's high places, and reck'd0 notWhat lovely flowers might perish in his path. cared And here at length is somewhat of revenge: For man's most golden dreams of pride and power 130 Are vain as any woman-dreams of love; Both end in weary brow and wither'd heart, And the grave closes over those whose hopes Have lain there long before. 1827 Revenge Ay, gaze upon her rose-wreathed hair, And gaze upon her smile; Seem as you drank the very air Her breath perfumed the while: 5 And wake for her the gifted line, That wild and witching lay, And swear your heart is as a shrine, That only owns her sway. 10'Tis well: I am revenged at last,? Mark you that scornful cheek,? The eye averted as you pass'd, Spoke more than words could speak. 15Ay, now by all the bitter tears That I have shed for thee,? The racking doubts, the burning fears,? Avenged they well may be? 20By the nights pass'd in sleepless care, The days of endless woe; All that you taught my heart to bear, All that yourself
