So, we'll go no more a roving
So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.
For the sword outwears its sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And love itself have rest.
Though the night was made for loving,
And the day returns too soon,
Yet we'll go no more a roving
By the light of the moon.
This is by Lord Byron and very evocative. It may be his best-known poem today. Manfred and Don Juan made a huge stir 200 years ago. I've not read Manfred but I have read Don Juan, and probably will again. But it is not a moving poem; it is funny and racy and cleverly-versified; and the references were topical at the the time it was written. I like it, but I don't think it is very deep.
Lord Byron was an Hellenophile and famously went out to support the fight for Greek independence. He died at Missolonghi in 1824, during the military campaign, it seems of malaria, and becames a Greek national hero. When I first visited Greece in the 1970s, small bars and restaurants often had a picture of Lord Byron on the wall, 150 years after his death.
