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THE COURSE OF TIME: PROXIMITIES, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: The memphian mummy, that from age to age
Last Line: The clown that long had slumbered in his arms.
Alternate Author Name(s): Pollok, Robert
Subject(s): Bones; Dust; Egyptology; Mummies; Mystery


THE Memphian mummy, that from age to age
Descending, bought and sold a thousand times,
In hall of curious antiquary stowed,
Wrapped in mysterious weeds, the wondrous theme
Of many an erring tale, shook off its rags;
And the brown son of Egypt stood beside
The European, his last purchaser.
In vale remote, the hermit rose, surprised
At crowds that rose around him, where he thought
His slumbers had been single; and the bard,
Who fondly covenanted with his friend,
To lay his bones beneath the sighing bough
Of some old lonely tree, rising, was pressed
By multitudes that claimed their proper dust
From the same spot; and he, that, richly hearsed,
With gloomy garniture of purchased wo,
Embalmed, in princely sepulchre was laid,
Apart from vulgar men, built nicely round
And round by the proud heir, who blushed to think
His father's lordly clay should ever mix
With peasant dust,—saw by his side awake
The clown that long had slumbered in his arms.





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