Sweet Day, so cool, so calm, so bright,
The bridall of the earth and skie;
The dew shall weep thy fall to-night;
For thou must die.
Sweet Rose, whose hue angrie and brave
Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye,
Thy root is ever in its grave,
And all must die.
Sweet Spring, full of sweet dayes and...
LIKE as the damask rose you see,
Or like the blossom on the tree,
Or like the dainty flower in May,
Or like the morning of the day,
Or like the sun, or like the shade,
Or like the gourd which Jonas had,—
E’en such is man; whose thread is spun,
Drawn out, and cut, and so is done.—
The rose withers, the blossom...
O Why should the spirit of mortal be proud?
Like a fast-flitting meteor, a fast-flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,
He passes from life to his rest in the grave.
The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade,
Be scattered around and together be laid;
And the young and the old, and the low and the high,
Shall...
LEAVES have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north-wind’s breath,
And stars to set—but all,
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, oh! Death.
Day is for mortal care,
Eve for glad meetings round the joyous hearth,
Night for the dreams of sleep, the voice of prayer—
But all for thee, thou mightiest of the...
Between the falling leaf and rose-bud’s breath;
The bird’s forsaken nest and her new song
(And this is all the time there is for Death);
The worm and butterfly—it is not long!
From “The Giaour”
HE who hath bent him o’er the dead
Ere the first day of death is fled,
The first dark day of nothingness,
The last of danger and distress,
(Before Decay’s effacing fingers
Have swept the lines where beauty lingers,)
And marked the mild angelic air,
The rapture of repose, that ’s there,
...
[“In the middle of the room, in its white coffin, lay the dead child, the nephew of the poet. Near it, in a great chair, sat Walt Whitman, surrounded by little ones, and holding a beautiful little girl on his lap. She looked wonderingly at the spectacle of death, and then inquiringly into the old man’s face. ‘You don’t know what it is, do you, my dear?’ said he, and added, ‘We don’t, either...
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, ere he is aware. When thoughts
...
What if some morning, when the stars were paling,
And the dawn whitened, and the east was clear,
Strange peace and rest fell on me from the presence
Of a benignant spirit standing near;
And I should tell him, as he stood beside me:—
“This is our earth—most friendly earth, and fair;
Daily its sea and shore through sun and shadow
...
“Two hands upon the breast, and labor is past.”
—RUSSIAN PROVERB.
“TWO hands upon the breast,
And labor ’s done;
Two pale feet crossed in rest,—
The race is won;
Two eyes with coin-weights shut,
And all tears cease;
Two lips where grief is mute,
Anger at peace:”
So pray we oftentimes, mourning our lot...
