Matthew Arnold (1822–88). The Poems of Matthew Arnold, 1840–1867. 1909.
The Strayed Reveller, and Other PoemsTo my Friends
[First published 1849. Reprinted 1853, ’54, ’57.]
L
Lightly quit what lightly came:
Rich to-morrow as to-day
Spend as madly as you may.
I, with little land to stir,
Am the exacter labourer.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
Hast liv’d light as these live now:
As these are, thou too wert such:
Much hast had, hast squander’d much.’
Fortune’s now less frequent heir,
Ah! I husband what’s grown rare.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
If too hotly mus’d upon:
And our best impressions are
Those that do themselves repair.’
Many a face I then let by,
Ah! is faded utterly.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
So the coming year’ll be spent:
Some day next year, I shall be,
Entering heedless, kiss’d by thee.’
Ah! I hope—yet, once away,
What may chain us, who can say?
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
Her soft face, her hair around:
Tied under the archest chin
Mockery ever ambush’d in.
Let the fluttering fringes streak
All her pale, sweet-rounded cheek.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
As she towards me lean’d her face,
Half refus’d and half resign’d,
Murmuring, ‘Art thou still unkind?’
Many a broken promise then
Was new made—to break again.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
Eager tell-tales of her mind:
Paint, with their impetuous stress
Of inquiring tenderness,
Those frank eyes, where deep doth lie
An angelic gravity.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
Show, you say, my love declines?
To paint ill as I have done,
Proves forgetfulness begun?
Time’s gay minions, pleas’d you see,
Time, your master, governs me.
Pleas’d, you mock the fruitless cry
‘Quick, thy tablets, Memory!’
Leaves us true to nothing long.
Yet, if little stays with man,
Ah! retain we all we can!
If the clear impression dies,
Ah! the dim remembrance prize!
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!