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nebroadweA young man turned thirty-six
He fought for liberty and died down in Greece.
It's a last day in the yellow leaf;
It's a heart that's eaten by canker and grief.
And isn't it Byronic ... don't you think?
It's Assyrians like wolves on the fold,
Cohorts gleamin' in purple and gold --
Like the forest leaves after Autumn hath blown,
Who would've thought they'd wither?
Childe Harold stood on the Bridge of Sighs,
Saw from out the wave enchanted structures rise.
He waited his whole damned life to see that sight
And as the dream dissolved, he thought,
"Nature doth not die."
And isn't it Byronic ... don't you think?
It's Assyrians like wolves on the fold,
Cohorts gleamin' in purple and gold --
Like the forest leaves after Autumn hath blown,
Who would've thought they'd wither?
Well, time has a funny way of sneaking up on you
When you think you've outlived yourself by many a day and night:
Your years have all been the prey of ceaseless vigils till
Your life seems a century long before e'en a fourth of that
Passed you by.
A Titan mute, to whose immortal eyes
Man's suff'rings were not for the Gods to despise:
It's the triumph of will against the wastage of life.
(It's meeting my Lord William Lamb
And then meeting his beautiful wife.)
And isn't it Byronic ... don't you think?
A little too Byronic ... and, yeah, I really do think ...
It's Assyrians like wolves on the fold,
Cohorts gleamin' in purple and gold --
Like the forest leaves after Autumn hath blown,
Who would've thought they'd wither?
Time has a funny way of sneaking up on you.
Time has a funny, funny way of passing you by,
Passing you by.
NOTES: It's been pointed out to me that it might help if I explained some of the "Byronies" of this piece. Verse 1 borrows from the poem "On This Day I Complete My Thirty-Sixth Year" (having aided the Greeks in their fight for independence from Turkish rule, Byron died of a chill three months after his thirty-sixth birthday in Missolonghi). The chorus, of course, ruthlessly plunders the rolling cadences of the first stanza of "The Destruction of Sennacherib." The second verse steals its imagery and phrasing from the fourth canto of "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" (based on Byron's own experiences on the Grand Tour in the early 1800s) and the bridge from the posthumously published "Epistle to Augusta" (Byron's sister, to whom he was so devoted it was rumored they ... well ...). The final verse cribs from "Prometheus," (Byron's ode to the fire-bringer's defiance of divine wrath) and alludes to the poet's (in)famous affair with Lady Caroline Lamb, the wife of William Lamb, Viscount Melbourne (later Prime Minister of Great Britain). More information about Byron and his poetry is available here.
[Calliope alone knows where that came from (except that my next project at work will involve our collection of Byroniana, including his tea caddy). I don't even like the original song: I'm an English major -- I know what irony is, and it isn't rain on your wedding day. That's just weather. (It might involve the pathetic fallacy, of course, particularly if you're being married in a melodrama. But that's another post.)]
He fought for liberty and died down in Greece.
It's a last day in the yellow leaf;
It's a heart that's eaten by canker and grief.
And isn't it Byronic ... don't you think?
It's Assyrians like wolves on the fold,
Cohorts gleamin' in purple and gold --
Like the forest leaves after Autumn hath blown,
Who would've thought they'd wither?
Childe Harold stood on the Bridge of Sighs,
Saw from out the wave enchanted structures rise.
He waited his whole damned life to see that sight
And as the dream dissolved, he thought,
"Nature doth not die."
And isn't it Byronic ... don't you think?
It's Assyrians like wolves on the fold,
Cohorts gleamin' in purple and gold --
Like the forest leaves after Autumn hath blown,
Who would've thought they'd wither?
Well, time has a funny way of sneaking up on you
When you think you've outlived yourself by many a day and night:
Your years have all been the prey of ceaseless vigils till
Your life seems a century long before e'en a fourth of that
Passed you by.
A Titan mute, to whose immortal eyes
Man's suff'rings were not for the Gods to despise:
It's the triumph of will against the wastage of life.
(It's meeting my Lord William Lamb
And then meeting his beautiful wife.)
And isn't it Byronic ... don't you think?
A little too Byronic ... and, yeah, I really do think ...
It's Assyrians like wolves on the fold,
Cohorts gleamin' in purple and gold --
Like the forest leaves after Autumn hath blown,
Who would've thought they'd wither?
Time has a funny way of sneaking up on you.
Time has a funny, funny way of passing you by,
Passing you by.
NOTES: It's been pointed out to me that it might help if I explained some of the "Byronies" of this piece. Verse 1 borrows from the poem "On This Day I Complete My Thirty-Sixth Year" (having aided the Greeks in their fight for independence from Turkish rule, Byron died of a chill three months after his thirty-sixth birthday in Missolonghi). The chorus, of course, ruthlessly plunders the rolling cadences of the first stanza of "The Destruction of Sennacherib." The second verse steals its imagery and phrasing from the fourth canto of "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" (based on Byron's own experiences on the Grand Tour in the early 1800s) and the bridge from the posthumously published "Epistle to Augusta" (Byron's sister, to whom he was so devoted it was rumored they ... well ...). The final verse cribs from "Prometheus," (Byron's ode to the fire-bringer's defiance of divine wrath) and alludes to the poet's (in)famous affair with Lady Caroline Lamb, the wife of William Lamb, Viscount Melbourne (later Prime Minister of Great Britain). More information about Byron and his poetry is available here.
[Calliope alone knows where that came from (except that my next project at work will involve our collection of Byroniana, including his tea caddy). I don't even like the original song: I'm an English major -- I know what irony is, and it isn't rain on your wedding day. That's just weather. (It might involve the pathetic fallacy, of course, particularly if you're being married in a melodrama. But that's another post.)]