Quote#Homeland
What is the light of a poet's name
Quote byLetitia Elizabeth Landon · 1802–1838
Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: The Improvisatrice (1824).
English (original)
What is the light of a poet's name, If it is not his country that hallows his fame? Where may he look for guerdon so fair As the honour and praise that await him there? His name will be lost and his grave forgot, If the tears of his country preserve them not! . . .
— Letitia Elizabeth Landon
More from Letitia Elizabeth Landon
... absence is The moonlight of affection ;
The leaves were gone from all, save where the pine Threw the wide shadow of its unchang'd green. I could not envy it that fadeless state.— Ah ! who would be the last, the only one That ruin spares—no ; if the blight must pass O'er all …
Methinks adieu Is cold, when uttered with aught else but tears.
Hope, frail but lovely shadow ! thou dost come, Like a bright vision on our pathway here, Making the gloomy future beautiful, And gilding our horizon with a light, The fairest human eye can ever know.
Once more my harp awakens ; once again, Tho' all unworthy be my hand to twine Th' etherial blossomings of poetry, I would call forth its numbers, yet would feel Its music fall like sunlight on my soul.
'Tis soothing, oh ! most soothing to the heart, To rove 'mid scenes where once we have been blest! Each tree, each blossom, has a thrilling charm; They seem memorials of those happier hours : The very sigh that tells they are no more, Is …