In After Time

No, my own love of other years!
No, it must never be.
Much rests with you that yet endears,
Alas! but what with me?
Could those bright years oer me revolve
So gay, oer you so fair,
The pearl of life we would dissolve
And each the cup might share.
You show that truth can neer decay,
Whatever fate befalls;
I, that the myrtle and the bay
Shoot fresh on ruind walls.

Walter Savage Landor

Walter Savage Landor was an English writer, poet, and dramatist. He is best known for his prose work, the 'Imaginary Conversations,' but also wrote numerous poems and plays. Landor had a tempestuous character and often found himself in conflict with authorities and contemporaries. Despite his combative nature, he was highly regarded by other literary figures such as Charles Dickens and Robert Browning. His works reflect his classical education and strong individualism.

Walter Savage Landor

Quotations I

Walter Savage Landor, Simple Poetry

Once, and once only, have I seen thy face,

Walter Savage Landor, Simple Poetry

She I love (alas in vain!)

Walter Savage Landor, Simple Poetry

To Sleep

Walter Savage Landor, Simple Poetry

English

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Years

Years, many parti-colourd years,
Some have crept on, and some have flown
Since first before me fell those tears
I never could see fall alone.

Years, not so many, are to come,
Years not so varied, when from you
One more will fall: when, carried home,
I see it not, nor hear Adieu.

Walter Savage Landor

Remain!

Remain, ah not in youth alone!
Tho' youth, where you are, long will stay,
But when my summer days are gone,
And my autumnal haste away.
'Can I be always by your side?'
No; but the hours you can, you must,
Nor rise at Death's approaching stride,
Nor go when dust is gone to dust.

Walter Savage Landor

Love's Landmarks

The woods we used to walk, my love,
    Are woods no more,
But' villas' now with sounding names -
    All name and door.

The pond, where, early on in March,
    The yellow cup
Of water-lilies made us glad,
    Is now filled up.

But ah! what if they fill or fell
    Each pond, each tree,
What matters it to-day, my love,
    To me - to thee?

The jerry-builder may consume,
    A greedy moth,
God's mantle of the living green,
    I feel no wrath;

Eat up the beauty of the world,
    And gorge his fill
On mead and winding country lane,
    And grassy hill.

I only laugh, for now of these
    I have no care,
Now that to me the fair is foul,
    And foul as fair.

Richard Le Gallienne

Twenty Years Hence

Twenty years hence my eyes may grow
If not quite dim, yet rather so,
Still yours from others they shall know
Twenty years hence.

Twenty years hence though it may hap
That I be called to take a nap
In a cool cell where thunderclap
Was never heard,

There breathe but o'er my arch of grass
A not too sadly sighed Alas,
And I shall catch, ere you can pass,
That winged word.

Walter Savage Landor

In Memory of Walter Savage Landor

Back to the flower-town, side by side,
The bright months bring,
New-born, the bridegroom and the bride,
Freedom and spring.

The sweet land laughs from sea to sea,
Filled full of sun;
All things come back to her, being free;
All things but one.

In many a tender wheaten plot
Flowers that were dead
Live, and old suns revive; but not
That holier head.

By this white wandering waste of sea,
Far north, I hear
One face shall never turn to me
As once this year:

Shall never smile and turn and rest
On mine as there,
Nor one most sacred hand be prest
Upon my hair.

I came as one whose thoughts half linger,
Half run before;
The youngest to the oldest singer
That England bore.

I found him whom I shal...

Algernon Charles Swinburne

To Wordsworth

Those who have laid the harp aside
And turn'd to idler things,
From very restlessness have tried
The loose and dusty strings.
And, catching back some favourite strain,
Run with it o'er the chords again.

But Memory is not a Muse,
O Wordsworth! though 'tis said
They all descend from her, and use
To haunt her fountain-head:
That other men should work for me
In the rich mines of Poesie,
Pleases me better than the toil
Of smoothing under hardened hand,
With Attic emery and oil,
The shining point for Wisdom's wand,
Like those thou temperest 'mid the rills
Descending from thy native hills.

Without his governance, in vain
Manhood is strong, and Youth is bold
If oftentimes the o'er-piled strain
Clogs in the furnace, and grows cold

Walter Savage Landor