Lord Byron says:

This is a poem a ran across today, and I liked it so much, I decided to include it. It has a lot of the same themes this blog deals with, so I figured it'd be right at home here. The past is no more. The future is not yet.

They say that Hope is happiness

Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas.*

--Virgil

They say that Hope is happiness--
But genuine Love must prize the past;
And Mem'ry wakes the thoughts that bless:
They rose the first--they set the last.

And all that mem'ry loves the most
Was once our only hope to be:
And all that hope adored and lost
Hath melted into memory.

Alas! it is delusion all--
The future cheats us from afar:
Nor can we be what we recall,
Nor dare we think on what we are.

*"Happy is he who has been able to learn the cause of things."

--Lord Byron, 1829.