Classic and Contemporary Poetry
SHELLEY AND TRELAWNEY, by JULIA COOLEY ALTROCCHI First Line: Beyond the walls of rome Last Line: Trelawney, the corsair! Subject(s): Cemeteries; Poetry & Poets; Shelley, Percy Bysshe (1792-1822); Trelawney, Edward John (1792-1881); Graveyards | ||||||||
(In the beautiful Protestant Cemetery outside of Rome, lie, under two neighboring slabs, the heart of Shelley, who died at twenty-nine, and the bones of the friend of his youth, Trelawney, who died in England at eighty -- the two friends reunited in the contem poraneous and eternal dust.) Beyond the walls of Rome, Within that shadowy niche of Paradise Which makes eternal home For certain English dead, Lie two, a youth, and one grown old and wise, Whose disparate dust is wed After a death apart, By half a life, -- Trelawney's aged bones And Shelley's youthful heart. One strode the solid earth With gripping feet, sensing the brittle stones, The slant of decks, the girth Of ships and the great sea. The other floated over fact, on wings Or winged heels, as free As wind and cloud and lark! But the grey dust has drawn them, feet and wings, Into the starless dark. Together, friend by friend, Among the cypresses and purple streams And flowers, that they shall blend With beauty, lying there, -- Shelley, the poet, the shadowy man of dreams, Trelawney, the corsair! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...POEM FOR MY TWENTIETH BIRTHDAY by KENNETH KOCH THERE IS ALWAYS A LITTLE WIND by TED KOOSER JEWISH GRAVEYARDS, ITALY by PHILIP LEVINE SAILING HOME FROM RAPALLO by ROBERT LOWELL THE HILL ABOVE THE MINE by MALCOLM COWLEY AUTUMN AND SPRING by JULIA COOLEY ALTROCCHI |
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