'

to the Countess Teresa Guiccioli,
August 25, 1819

My dearest Teresa, -
    I have read this book in your garden; - my love, you were absent, or else I could not have read it.  It is a favorite book of yours, and the writer was a friend of mine.  You will not understand these English words, and others will not understand them, - which is the reason I have not scrawled them in Italian.  But you will recognize the handwriting of him who passionately loves you, and you will divine that, over a book which was yours, he could only think of love.  In that word, beautiful in all languages, but most so in yours - Amor mio - is comprised my existence here and hereafter.  I feel I exist here, and I fear that I shall exist hereafter, - as to what purpose you will decide; my destiny rests with you, and you are a woman, seventeen years of age, and two out of a convent.  I wish that you had stayed there, with all my heart, - or, at least, that I had never met you in your married state.
    But all this is too late.  I love you, and you love me, - at least, you say so, and act as if you did so, which last is a great consolation in all events.  But I more than love you, and cannot cease to love you.
    Think of me, sometimes, when the Alps and the ocean divide us, - but they never will, unless you wish it.
                B.
 
 

to Byron: Letters