Lines Written on a Blank Leaf of the Pleasures of Memory
Lines Written on a Blank Leaf of the Pleasures of Memory - meaning Summary
Friendship and Memory Entwined
Byron addresses a beloved friend, celebrating how presence and absence alike are suffused with a special, almost magical bond. He imagines a future moment of loss when memory, likened to a mourner at a Druidic tomb, will sorrow yet also preserve and repay the friend’s devotion. Memory will honor and unite the names of speaker and friend, conferring an enduring, almost immortal communion across time.
Read Complete AnalysesAbsent or present, still to thee, My friend, what magic spells belong! As all can tell, who share, like me, In turn thy converse and thy song. But when the dreaded hour shall come By Friendship ever deem’d too nigh, And memory o’er her Druid’s tomb Shall weep that aught of thee can die, How fondly will she then repay Thy homage offer’d at her shrine, to And blend, while ages roll away, Her name immortally with thine!
April 19, 1812
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