Even the beauty of the rose doth cast, When its bright, fervid noon is past, A still and lengthening shadow in the dust Till darkness come And take its strange dream home. The transient bubbles of the water paint 'Neath their frail arch a shadow faint; The golden nimbus of the windowed saint, Till shine the stars, Casts pale and trembling bars. The loveliest thing earth hath, a shadow hath, A dark and livelong hint of death, Haunting it ever till its last faint breath. . . Who, then, may tell The beauty of heaven's shadowless asphodel? | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...BUNKER HILL by GEORGE HENRY CALVERT ON THE LIFE OF MAN by WALTER RALEIGH POLITICAL GREATNESS by PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY THE MOTHERLAND by WILLIAM WORDSWORTH ODES: BOOK 1: ODE 2. ON THE WINTER SOLSTICE, 1740 by MARK AKENSIDE CHERRY TREE IN AUTUMN by MARIE DAVIES WARREN BECKNER CLOUD-CLIMBING by LOUISA SARAH BEVINGTON THE WATERS OF LETHE by HARRY RANDOLPH BLYTHE EPIGRAM TO DON ANTONIO, KING OF PORTUGAL by WILLIAM BROWNE (1591-1643) |