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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

AT LORD BYRON'S TOMB by CINCINNATUS HEINE MILLER

Poet Analysis

First Line: O MASTER, HERE I BOW BEFORE A SHRINE
Last Line: FOR FAME IS BROKEN HERE, AND HERE HE PLEADS FOR REST.
O Master, here I bow before a shrine;
Before the lordliest dust that ever yet
Moved animate in human form divine.
Lo! dust indeed to dust. The mold is set
Above thee and the ancient walls are wet,
And drip all day in dank and silent gloom,
As if the cold gray stones could not forget
Thy great estate shrunk to this somber room,
But lean to weep perpetual tears above thy tomb.

Before me lie the oak-crown'd Annesley hills,
Before me lifts the ancient Annesley Hall
Above the mossy oaks. . . . A picture fills
With forms of other days. A maiden tall
And fair; a fiery restless boy, with all
The force of man! a steed that frets without;
A long thin sword that rusts upon the wall. . . .
The generations pass. . . . Behold! about
The ivied hall the fair-hair'd children sport and shout.

A bay wreath, wound by Ina of the West,
Hangs damp and stain'd upon the dark gray wall,
Above thy time-soil'd tomb and tatter'd crest;
A bay wreath gather'd by the seas that call
To orient Cathay, that break and fall
On shell-lined shores before Tahiti's breeze.
A slab, a crest, a wreath, and these are all
Neglected, tatter'd, torn; yet only these
The world bestows for song that rivall'd singing seas.

A bay-wreath wound by one more truly brave
Than Shastan; fair as thy eternal fame,
She sat and wove above the sunset wave,
And wound and sang thy measures and thy name.
'Twas wound by one, yet sent with one acclaim
By many, fair and warm as flowing wine,
And purely true, and tall as growing flame,
That list and lean in moonlight's mellow shine
To tropic tales of love in other tongues than thine.

I bring this idle reflex of thy task,
And my few loves, to thy forgotten tomb;
I leave them here; and here all pardon ask
Of thee, and patience ask of singers whom
Thy majesty hath silenced. I resume
My staff, and now my face is to the West;
My feet are worn; the sun is gone, a gloom
Has mantled Hucknall, and the minstrel's zest
For fame is broken here, and here he pleads for rest.



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