No more the white refulgent streets, Never the dry hollows of the mind Shall he in fine courtesy walk Again, for death is not unkind. A civil war cast on his fame, The four years' odium of strife Unbodies his dust; love cannot warm His tall corpuscles to this life. What will we gain? What did we lose? Be still: grief for the pious dead Suspires from bosoms of kind souls Lavender-wise, propped up in bed. Our loss put six feet under ground Is measured by the magnolia's root; Our gain's the intellectual sound Of death's feet round a weedy tomb. In the back chambers of the State (Just preterition for his crimes) We curse him to our busy sky Who's busy in a hell of a hundred times A day, though profitless his task, Heedless what Belial may say - He who wore out the perfect mask Orestes fled in night and day. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...RECESSIONAL (1) by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON EARLY RISING by JOHN GODFREY SAXE THE SCHOLARS by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS POST MORTEM by GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER PSALM 2. QUARE FREMUERUNT GENTES by OLD TESTAMENT BIBLE A LYRIC OF AUTUMN by WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE TO THE PRESIDENT OF MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD by ROBERT SEYMOUR BRIDGES |