Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard 3307

On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
E'en from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires.

For thee, who, mindful of the unhonored dead,
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;
If chance, by lonely contemplation led,

Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,—

Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,

"Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn Brushing with hasty steps the dews away

To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.

"There at the foot of yonder nodding beech
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

"Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,

Muttering his wayward fancies he would rove, Now drooping, woeful-wan, like one forlorn,

Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless love.

"One morn I missed him on the 'customed hill, Along the heath, and near his favorite tree; Another came; nor yet beside the rill,

Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he:

"The next, with dirges due in sad array,

Slow through the church-way path we saw him borne. Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn:"

THE EPITAPH

Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth
A Youth, to Fortune and to Fame unknown.
Fair Science frowned not on his humble birth,
And Melancholy marked him for her own.

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heaven did a recompense as largely send:
He gave to Misery (all he had) a tear,

He gained from Heaven ('twas all he wished) a friend.

No farther seek his merits to disclose,

Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, (There they alike in trembling hope repose,)

The bosom of his Father and his God.

Thomas Gray [1716-1771]

"AND THOU ART DEAD"

Heu, quanto minus est cum reliquis versari quam tui meminissel

AND thou art dead, as young and fair
As aught of mortal birth;

And form so soft, and charms so rare,
Too soon returned to Earth!

Though Earth received them in her bed,
And o'er the spot the crowd may tread
In carelessness or mirth,

There is an eye which could not brook
A moment on that grave to look.

I will not ask where thou liest low

Nor gaze upon the spot;

There flowers or weeds at will may grow

So I behold them not:

It is enough for me to prove

That what I loved, and long must love,
Like common earth can rot;

To me there needs no stone to tell
'Tis Nothing that I loved so well.

Yet did I love thee to the last,
As fervently as thou,

Who didst not change through all the past
And canst not alter now.

"And Thou Art Dead"

The love where Death has set his seal

Nor age can chill, nor rival steal,

Nor falsehood disavow:

And, what were worse, thou canst not see
Or wrong, or change, or fault in me.

The better days of life were ours;

The worst can be but mine:

The sun that cheers, the storm that lowers,
Shall never more be thine.

The silence of that dreamless sleep

I envy now too much to weep;

Nor need I to repine

That all those charms have passed away
I might have watched through long decay.

The flower in ripened bloom unmatched
Must fall the earliest prey;
Though by no hand untimely snatched,
The leaves must drop away:

And yet it were a greater grief
To watch it withering, leaf by leaf,
Than see it plucked to-day;
Since earthly eye but ill can bear
To trace the change to foul from fair.

I know not if I could have borne

To see thy beauties fade;

The night that followed such a morn
Had worn a deeper shade:

Thy day without a cloud hath passed,
And thou wert lovely to the last,
Extinguished, not decayed;

As stars that shoot along the sky
Shine brightest as they fall from high.

As once I wept, if I could weep,
My tears might well be shed
To think I was not near, to keep
One vigil o'er thy bed:

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To gaze, how fondly! on thy face,
To fold thee in a faint embrace,
Uphold thy drooping head;
And show that love, however vain,
Nor thou nor I can feel again.

Yet how much less it were to gain,
Though thou hast left me free,
The loveliest things that still remain,
Than thus remember thee!
The all of thine that cannot die
Through dark and dread Eternity
Returns again to me,

And more thy buried love endears
Than aught, except its living years.
George Gordon Byron [1788-1824]

DIRGE

CALM on the bosom of thy God,

Fair spirit, rest thee now!

E'en while with ours thy footsteps trod,

His seal was on thy brow.

Dust, to its narrow house beneath!

Soul, to its place on high!

They that have seen thy look in death
No more may fear to die.

Lone are the paths, and sad the bowers,
Whence thy meek smile is gone;

But oh! a brighter home than ours

In heaven, is now thine own.

Felicia Dorothea Hemans [1793-1835]

A DIRGE

Now is done thy long day's work;
Fold thy palms across thy breast,
Fold thine arms, turn to thy rest.
Let them rave.

A Dirge

Shadows of the silver birk

Sweep the green that folds thy grave.
Let them rave.

Thee nor carketh care nor slander;
Nothing but the small cold worm
Fretteth thine enshrouded form.
Let them rave.

Light and shadow ever wander
O'er the green that folds thy grave.
Let them rave.

Thou wilt not turn upon thy bed;
Chanteth not the brooding bee
Sweeter tones than calumny?

Let them rave.

Thou wilt never raise thine head
From the green that folds thy grave.
Let them rave.

Crocodiles wept tears for thee;
The woodbine and eglatere

Drip sweeter dews than traitor's tear.
Let them rave.

Rain makes music in the tree

O'er the green that folds thy grave.
Let them rave.

Round thee blow, self-pleachèd deep,
Bramble roses, faint and pale,

And long purples of the dale.

Let them rave.

These in every shower creep

Through the green that folds thy grave.
Let them rave.

The gold-eyed kingcups fine,

The frail bluebell peereth over

Rare broidery of the purple clover.

Let them rave.

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