"Nor when the bosom's wasted fires / Are all extinct, is anguish o'er; / For jealousy, which ne'er expires, / Can wound--when passion is no more."
— Robinson [Née Darby], Mary [Perdita] (1758-1800)
Place of Publication
London
Date
1797, 1806
Metaphor
"Nor when the bosom's wasted fires / Are all extinct, is anguish o'er; / For jealousy, which ne'er expires, / Can wound--when passion is no more."
Metaphor in Context
A thousand torments wait on love;
The sigh, the tear, the anguish'd groan!
But he who never learnt to prove
A jealous pang, has nothing known.
For jealousy, supreme of woe,
Nurs'd by distorted fancy's pow'r,
Can round the heart bid mis'ry grow,
Which darkens with the ling'ring hour;
While shadows, blanks to reason 's orb,
In dread succession haunt the brain;
And pangs, that ev'ry pang absorb,
In wild convulsive tumults reign.
At morn, at eve, the fever burns,
While phantoms tear the aching breast;
Day brings no calm, and night returns,
But marks no soothing hour of rest.
Nor when the bosom's wasted fires
Are all extinct, is anguish o'er;
For jealousy, which ne'er expires,
Can wound--when passion is no more.
(Cf. Vol. I, p. 290 in 1797 printing)
The sigh, the tear, the anguish'd groan!
But he who never learnt to prove
A jealous pang, has nothing known.
For jealousy, supreme of woe,
Nurs'd by distorted fancy's pow'r,
Can round the heart bid mis'ry grow,
Which darkens with the ling'ring hour;
While shadows, blanks to reason 's orb,
In dread succession haunt the brain;
And pangs, that ev'ry pang absorb,
In wild convulsive tumults reign.
At morn, at eve, the fever burns,
While phantoms tear the aching breast;
Day brings no calm, and night returns,
But marks no soothing hour of rest.
Nor when the bosom's wasted fires
Are all extinct, is anguish o'er;
For jealousy, which ne'er expires,
Can wound--when passion is no more.
(Cf. Vol. I, p. 290 in 1797 printing)
Categories
Provenance
Reading
Citation
Text from The Poetical Works of the Late Mrs Mary Robinson: Including Many Pieces Never Before Published. 3 vols. (London: Printed for Richard Phillips, 1806). <Link to vol. I in Google Books><Vol. II><Vol. III>
Found in Walsingham; or, the Pupil of Nature. A Domestic Story. By Mary Robinson, 4 vols. (London: Printed for T. N. Longman, 1797). <Link to ECCO>
Found in Walsingham; or, the Pupil of Nature. A Domestic Story. By Mary Robinson, 4 vols. (London: Printed for T. N. Longman, 1797). <Link to ECCO>
Date of Entry
10/15/2013
