The Giaour

No breath of air to break the wave That rolls below the Athenian’s grave, That tomb which, gleaming o’er the cliff, First greets the homeward-veering skiff High o’er the land he saved in vain; When shall such Hero live again?

Fair clime! where every season smiles Benignant o’er those blessed isles, Which, seen from far Colonna’s height, Make glad the heart that hails the sight, And lend to loneliness delight. There mildly dimpling, Ocean’s cheek Reflects the tints of many a peak Caught by the laughing tides that lave These Edens of the eastern wave: And if at times a transient breeze Break the blue crystal of the seas, Or sweep one blossom from the trees, How welcome is each gentle air That wakes and wafts the odours there! For there the Rose, o’er crag or vale, Sultana of the Nightingale, The maid for whom his melody, His thousand songs are heard on high, Blooms blushing to her lover’s tale: His queen, the garden queen, his Rose, Unbent by winds, unchilled by snows, Far from the winters of the west, By every breeze and season blest, Returns the sweets by Nature given In softest incense back to Heaven; And grateful yields that smiling sky Her fairest hue and fragrant sigh. And many a summer flower is there, And many a shade that Love might share, And many a grotto, meant for rest, That holds the pirate for a guest; Whose bark in sheltering cove below Lurks for the passing peaceful prow, Till the gay mariner’s guitar Is heard, and seen the Evening Star; Then stealing with the muffled oar, Far shaded by the rocky shore, Rush the night-prowlers on the prey, And turn to groans his roundelay. Strange—that where Nature loved to trace, As if for Gods, a dwelling place, And every charm and grace hath mixed Within the Paradise she fixed, There man, enamoured of distress, Should mar it into wilderness, And trample, brute-like, o’er each flower That tasks not one laborious hour; Nor claims the culture of his hand To bloom along the fairy land, But springs as to preclude his care, And sweetly woos him—but to spare! Strange—that where all is Peace beside, There Passion riots in her pride, And Lust and Rapine wildly reign To darken o’er the fair domain. It is as though the Fiends prevailed Against the Seraphs they assailed, And, fixed on heavenly thrones, should dwell The freed inheritors of Hell; So soft the scene, so formed for joy, So curst the tyrants that destroy!