Death

L' aura e l' odore e 'l refrigerio e l' ombra.

HER OWN VIRTUES IMMORTALISE HER IN HEAVEN, AND HIS PRAISES ON EARTH.


    The air and scent, the comfort and the shade
Of my sweet laurel, and its flowery sight,
That to my weary life gave rest and light,
Death, spoiler of the world, has lowly laid.
As when the moon our sun's eclipse has made,
My lofty light has vanish'd so in night;
For aid against himself I Death invite;
With thoughts so dark does Love my breast invade.
Thou didst but sleep, bright lady, a brief sleep,
In bliss amid the chosen spirits to wake,
Who gaze upon their God, distinct and near:
And if my verse shall any value keep,
Preserved and praised 'mid noble minds to make
Thy name, its memory shall be deathless here.

...

(Suggested by the book of Mr. Ed. C. Randall.)



'There is no death, there are no dead.'
    From zone to zone, from sphere to sphere,
    The souls of all who pass from here
By hosts of living thoughts are led;
And dark or bright, those souls must tread
    The paths they fashioned year on year.
    For hells are built of hate or fear,
And heavens of love our lives have shed.

Across unatlassed worlds of space,
    And through God's mighty universe,
    With thoughts that bless or thoughts that curse,
Each journeys to his rightful place.
    Oh, greater truth no man has said,
    'There is no death, there are no dead.'

It lifts the mourner from the sod,
    And bids him cast away the reed
    Of some uncomforting poor creed,

Time has made conquest of so many things
That once were mine.    Swift-footed, eager youth
That ran to meet the years; bold brigand health,
That broke all laws of reason unafraid,
And laughed at talk of punishment.

Close ties of blood and friendship, joy of life,
Which reads its music in the major key
And will not listen to a minor strain -
These things and many more are spoils of time.

Yet as a conqueror who only storms
The outposts of a town, and finds the fort
Too strong to be assailed, so time retreats
And knows his impotence.    He cannot take

My three great jewels from the crown of life:
Love, sympathy, and faith; and year on year
He sees them grow in lustre and in worth,
And glowers by me, plucking at his beard,
And dragging, as h...

Here is a tale for any man or woman:
A fool sought Death; and braved him with his bauble
Among the graves. At last he heard a hobble,
And something passed him, monstrous, super-human.
And by a tomb, that reared a broken column,
He heard it stop. And then Gargantuan laughter
Shattered the hush. Deep silence followed after,
Filled with the stir of bones, cadaverous, solemn.
Then said the fool:"Come! show thyself, old prancer!
I'll have a bout with thee. I, too, can clatter
My wand and motley. Come now! Death and Folly,
See who's the better man." There was no answer;
Only his bauble broke; a serious matter
To the poor fool who died of melancholy.

My lover died a century ago,
Her dear heart stricken by my sland'rous breath,
Wherefore the Gods forbade that I should know
The peace of death.

Men pass my grave, and say, "'Twere well to sleep,
Like such an one, amid the uncaring dead!"
How should they know the vigils that I keep,
The tears I shed?

Upon the grave, I count with lifeless breath,
Each night, each year, the flowers that bloom and die,
Deeming the leaves, that fall to dreamless death,
More blest than I.

'Twas just last year, I heard two lovers pass
So near, I caught the tender words he said:
To-night the rain-drenched breezes sway the grass
Above his head.

That night full envious of his life was I,
That youth and love should stand at his behest;
To-night, I envy h...

As the funeral train with its honoured dead
    On its mournful way went sweeping,
While a sorrowful nation bowed its head
    And the whole world joined in weeping,
I thought, as I looked on the solemn sight,
    Of the one fond heart despairing,
And I said to myself, as in truth I might,
    "How sad must be this SHARING."

To share the living with even Fame,
    For a heart that is only human,
Is hard, when Glory asserts her claim
    Like a bold, insistent woman;
Yet a great, grand passion can put aside
    Or stay each selfish emotion,
And watch, with a pleasure that springs from pride,
    Its rival - the world's devotion.

But Death should render to love its own,
    And my heart bowed down and sorrowed
For the stricken woman who wep...

        It seemeth such a little way to me
    Across to that strange country - the Beyond;
        And yet, not strange, for it has grown to be
    The home of those of whom I am so fond,
        They make it seem familiar and most dear,
        As journeying friends bring distant regions near.

        So close it lies that when my sight is clear
    I think I almost see the gleaming strand.
        I know I feel those who have gone from here
    Come near enough sometimes to touch my hand.
        I often think, but for our veiled eyes,
        We should find Heaven right round about us lies.

        I cannot make it seem a day to dread,
    When from this dear earth I shall journey out
        To that still dearer country of the dead,
    And join th...

The shadow of Dawn;
Stillness and stars and over-mastering dreams
Of Life and Death and Sleep;
Heard over gleaming flats the old unchanging sound
Of the old unchanging Sea.

My soul and yours,
O hand in hand let us fare forth, two ghosts,
Into the ghostliness,
The infinite and abounding solitudes,
Beyond, O beyond! beyond . . .

Here in the porch
Upon the multitudinous silences
Of the kingdoms of the grave,
We twain are you and I, two ghosts Omnipotence
Can touch no more, no more!

    Though I have watched so many mourners weep
    O'er the real dead, in dull earth laid asleep -
    Those dead seemed but the shadows of my days
    That passed and left me in the sun's bright rays.
    Now though you go on smiling in the sun
    Our love is slain, and love and you were one.
    You are the first, you I have known so long,
    Whose death was deadly, a tremendous wrong.
    Therefore I seek the faith that sets it right
    Amid the lilies and the candle-light.
    I think on Heaven, for in that air so clear
    We two may meet, confused and parted here.
    Ah, when man's dearest dies, 'tis then he goes
    To that old balm that heals the centuries' woes.
    Then Christ's wild cry in all the streets is rife: -
    "I am the Resurrection and th...

The shadow of Dawn;
Stillness and stars and over-mastering dreams
Of Life and Death and Sleep;
Heard over gleaming flats, the old, unchanging sound
Of the old, unchanging Sea.

My soul and yours -
O, hand in hand let us fare forth, two ghosts,
Into the ghostliness,
The infinite and abounding solitudes,
Beyond - O, beyond! - beyond . . .

Here in the porch
Upon the multitudinous silences
Of the kingdoms of the grave,
We twain are you and I - two ghosts Omnipotence
Can touch no more . . . no more!

Ask not why hearts turn Magazines of passions,
And why that grief is clad in sev'ral fashions;
Why She on progress goes, and doth not borrow
The smallest respite from th'extreams of sorrow,
Her misery is got to such an height,
As makes the earth groan to support its weight,
Such storms of woe, so strongly have beset her,
She hath no place for worse, nor hope for better;
Her comfort is, if any for her be,
That none can shew more cause of grief then she.
Ask not why some in mournfull black are clad;
The Sun is set, there needs must be a shade.
Ask not why every face a sadness shrowdes;
The setting Sun ore-cast us hath with Clouds.
Ask not why the great glory of the Skye
That gilds the stars with heavenly Alchamy,
Which all the world doth lighten with his rayes,<...

Take them, O Death! and bear away
    Whatever thou canst call thine own!
Thine image, stamped upon this clay,
    Doth give thee that, but that alone!

Take them, O Grave! and let them lie
    Folded upon thy narrow shelves,
As garments by the soul laid by,
    And precious only to ourselves!

Take them, O great Eternity!
    Our little life is but a gust
That bends the branches of thy tree,
    And trails its blossoms in the dust!

Subjoined To The Yearly Bill Of Mortality Of The Parish Of All Saints, Northampton, Anno Domini 1787.


(Composed for John Cox, parish clerk of Northampton.)


Pallida mors æquo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas,
Regumque turres.—Horace.


Pale death with equal foot strikes wide the door
Of royal halls and hovels of the poor.


While thirteen moons saw smoothly run
The Nen’s barge-laden wave,
All these, life’s rambling journey done,
Have found their home, the grave.


Was man (frail always) made more frail
Than in foregoing years?
Did famine or did plague prevail,
That so much death appears?


No; these were vigorous as their sires,
Nor plague nor famine came;
This annual tribute Death requires,
And ...

Persephone, Persephone!
Still I fancy I can see
Thee amid the daffodils.
Golden wealth thy basket fills;
Golden blossoms at thy breast;
Golden hair that shames the West;
Golden sunlight round thy head!
Ah! the golden years have fled;
Thee have reft, and me have left
Here alone, thy loss to mourn.

Persephone, Persephone!
Still I fancy I can see
Her, as white and still she lies:
Death has woo'd and won his prize.
White the blossoms at her breast;
White and still her face at rest;
White the moonbeams round her head.
Ah! the wintry years have fled;
Comfort lent and patience sent,
And my grief is easier borne.

Persephone, Persephone!
Still in dreams thou com'st to me;
Every night art at my side,
Half my bride, and half...

To him who in the love of Nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty, and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, e're he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;
Go forth, under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around,
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air,
Comes a still voice, Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In a...

Ah, think how one compelled for life to abide
Locked in a dungeon needs must eat the heart
Out of his own humanity, and part
With every hope that mutual cares provide;
And, should a less unnatural doom confide
In life-long exile on a savage coast,
Soon the relapsing penitent may boast
Of yet more heinous guilt, with fiercer pride.
Hence thoughtful Mercy, Mercy sage and pure,
Sanctions the forfeiture that Law demands,
Leaving the final issue in 'His' hands
Whose goodness knows no change, whose love is sure,
Who sees, foresees; who cannot judge amiss,
And wafts at will the contrite soul to bliss.

(Athenaeum, October 14, 1848)


Chide not; let me breathe a little,
    For I shall not mourn him long;
Though the life-cord was so brittle,
    The love-cord was very strong.
I would wake a little space
Till I find a sleeping-place.

You can go, - I shall not weep;
    You can go unto your rest.
My heart-ache is all too deep,
    And too sore my throbbing breast.
Can sobs be, or angry tears,
Where are neither hopes nor fears?

Though with you I am alone
    And must be so everywhere,
I will make no useless moan, -
    None shall say 'She could not bear:'
While life lasts I will be strong, -
But I shall not struggle long.

Listen, listen! Everywhere
    A low voice is calling me,
And a step is on the sta...

    The loose earth falls in the grave like a peaceful regular breathing;
    Too like, for I was deceived a moment by the sound:
    It has covered the heap of bracken that the gardener laid above him;
    Quiet the spade swings: there we have now his mound.

    A patch of fresh earth on the floor of the wood's renewing chamber:
    All around is grass and moss and the hyacinth's dark green sprouts:
    And oaks are above that were old when his fiftieth sire was a puppy:
    And far away in the garden I hear the children's shouts.

    Their joy is remote as a dream.    It is strange how we buy our sorrow
    For the touch of perishing things, idly, with open eyes;
    How we give our hearts to brutes that will die in a few seasons,
    Nor trouble what we do when we do it...