Classic and Contemporary Poetry
ON THE DEATH OF IDA, by DAVID MACBETH MOIR Poet's Biography First Line: Tis midnight deep; the full, round moon Last Line: The bliss that once was ours! Alternate Author Name(s): Delta Subject(s): Absence; Death; Farewell; Graves; Love - Loss Of; Solitude; Separation; Isolation; Dead, The; Parting; Tombs; Tombstones; Loneliness | ||||||||
I. 'Tis midnight deep; the full, round moon, As 'twere a spectre, walks the sky; The balmy breath of gentlest June Just stirs the stream that murmurs by: Above me frowns the solemn wood; Nature, methinks, seems Solitude Embodied to the eye. II. Yes, 'tis a season and a scene, Ida, to think on thee: the day, With stir and strife, may come between Affection and thy beauty's ray; But feeling here assumes control, And mourns my desolated soul That thou art rapt away! III. Thou wert a rainbow to my sight, The storms of life before thee fled; The glory and the guiding light That onward cheered and upward led; From boyhood to this very hour, For me, and only me, thy flower Its fragrance seemed to shed. IV. Dark though the world for me might show Its sordid faith and selfish gloom, Yet, 'mid life's wilderness, to know For me that sweet flower shed its bloom, Was joy, was solacethou art gone And hope forsook me, when the stone Sank darkly o'er thy tomb. V. And art thou dead? I dare not think That thus the solemn truth can be; And broken is the only link That chain'd youth's pleasant thoughts to me! Alas! that thou couldst know decay That, sighing, I should live to say, "The cold grave holdeth thee!" VI. For me thou shon'st, as shines a star, Lonely, in clouds when heaven is lost; Thou wert my guiding light afar, When on misfortune's billows tost: Now darkness hath obscured that light, And I am left, in rayless night, On Sorrow's lowering coast. VII. And art thou gone? I deemed thee some Immortal essenceart thou gone? I saw thee laid within the tomb, And I am left to mourn alone: Once to have loved is to have loved Enough; and what with thee I proved, Again I'll seek in none. VIII. Earth in thy sight grew faëry land; Life was Elysiumthought was love When, long ago, hand clasped in hand, We roamed through Autumn's twilight grove; Or watched the broad uprising moon Shed, as it were, a wizard noon, The blasted heath above. IX. Farewell!and must I say farewell? Nothou wilt ever be to me A present thought; thy form shall dwell In love's most holy sanctuary; Thy voice shall mingle with my dreams, And haunt me when the shot-star gleams Above the rippling sea. X. Never revives the past again; But still thou art, in lonely hours, To me earth's heaven, the azure main, Soft music, and the breath of flowers; My heart shall gain from thee its hues; And Memory give, though truth refuse, The bliss that once was ours! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...IN ABEYANCE by DENISE LEVERTOV IN A VACANT HOUSE by PHILIP LEVINE SUNDAY ALONE IN A FIFTH FLOOR APARTMENT, CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS by WILLIAM MATTHEWS SILENCE LIKE COOL SAND by PAT MORA THE HONEY BEAR by EILEEN MYLES THE RUSTIC LAD'S LAMENT IN THE TOWN by DAVID MACBETH MOIR |
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