Lara: Canto The First (excerpt)


XVII
289 In him inexplicably mix'd appear'd
290 Much to be lov'd and hated, sought and fear'd.
291 Opinion varying o'er his hidden lot,
292 In praise or railing ne'er his name forgot;
293 His silence form'd a theme for others' prate;
294 They guess'd--they gaz'd--they fain would know his fate.
295 What had he been? what was he, thus unknown,
296 Who walk'd their world, his lineage only known?
297 A hater of his kind? yet some would say,
298 With them he could seem gay amidst the gay;
299 But own'd that smile, if oft observ'd and near,
300 Wan'd in its mirth and wither'd to a sneer;
301 That smile might reach his lip but pass'd not by,
302 None e'er could trace its laughter to his eye.
303 Yet there was softness too in his regard,
304 At times, a heart as not by nature hard,
305 But once perceiv'd, his spirit seem'd to chide
306 Such weakness as unworthy of its pride,
307 And steel'd itself, as scorning to redeem
308 One doubt from others' half withheld esteem;
309 In self-inflicted penance of a breast
310 Which tenderness might once have wrung from rest;
311 In vigilance of grief that would compel
312 The soul to hate for having lov'd too well.


XVIII
313 There was in him a vital sign of all:
314 As if the worst had fall'n which could befall,
315 He stood a stranger in this breathing world,
316 An erring spirit from another hurl'd;
317 A thing of dark imaginings, that shap'd
318 By choice the perils he by chance escap'd;
319 But 'scap'd in vain, for in their memory yet
320 His mind would half exult and half regret.
321 With more capacity for love than earth
322 Bestows on most of mortal mould and birth,
323 His early dreams of good outstripp'd the truth,
324 And troubled manhood follow'd baffled youth;
325 With thought of years in phantom chase misspent,
326 And wasted powers for better purpose lent;
327 And fiery passions that had pour'd their wrath
328 In hurried desolation o'er his path,
329 And left the better feelings all at strife
330 In wild reflection o'er his stormy life;
331 But haughty still and loth himself to blame,
332 He call'd on Nature's self to share the shame,
333 And charg'd all faults upon the fleshly form
334 She gave to clog the soul and feast the worm;
335 Till he at last confounded good and ill,
336 And half mistook for fate the acts of will.
337 Too high for common selfishness, he could
338 At times resign his own for others' good,
339 But not in pity, not because he ought,
340 But in some strange perversity of thought,
341 That sway'd him onward with a secret pride
342 To do what few or none would do beside;
343 And this same impulse would, in tempting time,
344 Mislead his spirit equally in crime;
345 So much he soar'd beyond, or sunk beneath,
346 The men with whom he felt condemn'd to breathe,
347 And long'd by good or ill to separate
348 Himself from all who shared his mortal state.
349 His mind abhorring this had fix'd her throne
350 Far from the world, in regions of her own:
351 Thus coldly passing all that pass'd below,
352 His blood in temperate seeming now would flow:
353 Ah! happier if it ne'er with guilt had glow'd,
354 But ever in that icy smoothness flow'd!
355 'T is true, with other men their path he walk'd,
356 And like the rest in seeming did and talk'd,
357 Nor outrag'd Reason's rules by flaw nor start,
358 His madness was not of the head, but heart;
359 And rarely wander'd in his speech, or drew
360 His thoughts so forth as to offend the view.

Lord Byron