Death poems
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The Triumph of Dead : Chap. 2
© Mary Sidney Herbert
That night, which did the dreadful hap ensue
That quite eclips'd, nay, rather did replace
The Lake of the Dismal Swamp
© Thomas Moore
"THEY made her a grave too cold and damp
For a soul so warm and true;
And she's gone to the Lake of the Dismal Swamp,
Where all night long, by a firefly lamp,
She paddles her white canoe.
Widow
© Sylvia Plath
Widow. The word consumes itself --
Body, a sheet of newsprint on the fire
Levitating a numb minute in the updraft
Over the scalding, red topography
That will put her heart out like an only eye.
The Old Mans Dream After He Died
© Robinson Jeffers
from CAWDOR
Gently with delicate mindless fingers
Cromwell
© Albert Durrant Watson
This too remember well
I learned it late: None but a tyrant makes
That good prevail that is not in men's hearts,
And tyranny is questionable good.
Therefore must all men learn by liberty,
And with what pain their doings on them bring.
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers: A Satire
© George Gordon Byron
These are the themes that claim our plaudits now;
These are the bards to whom the muse must bow;
While Milton, Dryden, Pope, alike forgot,
Resign their hallow'd bays to Walter Scott.
When Erin Awakes
© William Percy French
And as of old, our headlands bold
Still front the raging sea,
So may our band united stand,
As fearless and as free.
The Book of Phillip Sparrow
© John Skelton
It was so prety a fole,
It wold syt on a stole,
And lerned after my scole
For to kepe his cut,
With, "Phyllyp, kepe your cut!"
The Hawk
© Paul Hamilton Hayne
AMBUSHED in yonder cloud of white,
Far-glittering from its azure height,
He shrouds his swiftness and his might!
Poem from a Picture
© Margaret Widdemer
(Children at play on a French Battlefield)
"When I was a child,"
Tribute To The Memory Of The Same Dog
© William Wordsworth
LIE here, without a record of thy worth,
Beneath a covering of the common earth!
It is not from unwillingness to praise,
Or want of love, that here no Stone we raise;
Additions: The Fire at Tranter Sweatley's
© Thomas Hardy
She cried, "O pray pity me!" Nought would he hear;
Then with wild rainy eyes she obeyed,
She chid when her Love was for clinking off wi' her.
The pa'son was told, as the season drew near
To throw over pu'pit the names of the peäir
As fitting one flesh to be made.
Troop Train
© Karl Shapiro
It stops the town we come through. Workers raise
Their oily arms in good salute and grin.
Epitaph On A Beloved Friend
© George Gordon Byron
Oh, Friend! for ever loved, for ever dear!
What fruitless tears have bathed thy honour'd bier!
What sighs re'echo'd to thy parting breath,
Wilst thou wast struggling in the pangs of death!
In The Cup
© Wilcox Ella Wheeler
There is grief in the cup!
I saw a proud mother set wine on the board;
Sonnet XVIII
© Caroline Norton
ON HEARING OF THE DEATH OF THE COUNTESS OF BURLINGTON.
[Inscribed, with deep and earnest sympathy, to her Mother, The Countess of Carlisle.]
SINCE in the pleasant time of opening flowers
That flow'r, Her life, was doom'd to fade away,--
An Acknowledgment
© Henry King
My best of friends! what needs a chain to tie
One by your merit bound a Votarie?
Think you I have some plot upon my peace,
I would this bondage change for a release?
Dead- A Prisoner
© Katharine Tynan
He died the loneliest death of all,
Amid his foes he died.
But Someone's leaped the outer wall
And Someone's come inside,
And he has gotten a golden key
To set the lonesome prisoner free.
