The Isles of Greece
By
Lord Byron
( from: Don Juan, Canto the Third - LXXXVI )

1

The Isles of Greece, the Isles of Greece !

Where burning Sappho loved and sung,

Where grew the arts of War and Peace,

Where Delos rose, and Phœbus sprung !

Eternal summer gilds them yet,

But all, except their Sun, is set.

2

The Scian and Teian muse,

The Hero's harp, the Lover's lute,

Have found the fame your shores refuse:

Their place of birth alone is mute

To sounds which echo further west

Than your Sires' "Islands of the Blest."

3

The mountains look on Marathon ---

And Marathon looks on the sea;

And musing there an hour alone,

I dreamed that Greece might still be free;

For standing on the Persians' grave,

I could not deem myself a slave.

4

A King sate on the rocky brow

Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis;

And ships, by thousands, lay below,

And men in nations; --- all were his !

He counted them at break of day ---

And, when the Sun set, where were they?

5

And where are they? And where art thou,

My country? On thy voiceless shore

The heroic lay is tuneless now ---

The heroic bosom beats no more !

And must thy Lyre, so long divine,

Degenerate into hands like mine?

6

'T is something, in the dearth of Fame,

Though linked among a fettered race,

To feel at least a patriot's shame,

Even as I sing, suffuse my face;

For what is left the poet here?

For Greeks a blush --- for Greece a tear.

7

Must we but weep o'er days more blest?

Must we but blush? --- Our fathers bled.

Earth ! render back from out thy breast

A remnant of our Spartan dead !

Of the three hundred grant but three,

To make a new Thermopylæ !

8

What, silent still? and silent all?

Ah ! no; --- the voices of the dead

Sound like a distant torrent's fall,

And answer, "Let one living head,

But one arise, --- we come, we come ! "

'T is but the living who are dumb.

9

In vain -- in vain: strike other chords;

Fill high the cup with Samian wine !

Leave battles to the Turkish hordes,

And shed the blood of Scio's vine !

Hark ! rising to the ignoble call ---

How answers each bold Bacchanal !

10

You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet,

Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx gone?

Of two such lessons, why forget

The noblier and manlier one?

You have the letters Cadmus gave ---

Think ye he meant them for a slave?

11

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine !

We will not think of themes like these !

It made Anacreon's song divine:

He served --- but served Polycrates ---

A Tyrant; but our masters then

Were still, at least, our countrymen.

12

The Tyrant of the Chersonese

Was Freedom's best and bravest friend;

That tyrant was Miltiades !

Oh ! that the present hour would lend

Another despot of the kind !

Such chains as his were sure to bind.

13

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine !

On Suli's rock, and Parga's shore,

Exists the remnant of a line

Such as the Doric mothers bore;

And there, perhaps, such seed is sown,

The Heracleidan blood might own.

14

Trust not for freedom to the Franks ---

They have a king who buys and sells;

In native swords, and native ranks,

The only hope of courage dwells;

But Turkish force, and Latin fraud,

Would break your shield, however broad.

15

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine !

Our virgins dance beneath the shade ---

I see their glorious black eyes shine;

But gazing on each glowing maid,

My own the burning tear-drop laves,

To think such breasts must suckle slaves.

16

Place me on Sunium's marbled steep,

Where nothing, save the waves and I,

May hear our mutual murmurs sweep;

There, swan-like, let me sing and die;

A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine ---

Dash down yon cup of Samian wine !