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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


DEAD MEN by LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE

Poet Analysis

First Line: I STOOP AND PLUCK THE TANSY'S GOLD
Last Line: OR WHOSE GREAT SHIP, OR LONG-GONE ROSE?
Subject(s): DEATH; DEAD, THE;

I stoop and pluck the tansy's gold,
Stacked in the gusts along my lane;
A shadowy hand plucks there with me;
Some dead man claims his own again.

Not anything is wholly mine;
Platter, or book, or stretch of clod;
The hurt in the dusk's tumbling red;
Or even the texture of my God.

Gesture, and mood, and whim of tongue,
I share with them. About my door
The battle shrieks, and ere I know,
Two wage, where was but I before.

And when the wind limps by my sill,
And heaps the village dust, and goes,
Whose phantom cloak is left behind,
Or whose great ship, or long-gone rose?



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