Death poems
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The Children Of The Lord's Supper. (From The Swedish Of Bishop Tegner)
© Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Closed was the Teacher's task, and with heaven in their hearts and their faces,
Up rose the children all, and each bowed him, weeping full sorely,
Downward to kiss that reverend hand, but all of them pressed he
Moved to his bosom, and laid, with a prayer, his hands full of blessings,
Now on the holy breast, and now on the innocent tresses.
On The Death Of Canon Kingsley
© Paul Hamilton Hayne
MORTALS there are who seem, all over, flame,
Vitalized radiance, keen, intense, and high,
Whose souls, like planets in it dominant sky,
Burn with full forces of eternity:
Pentucket
© John Greenleaf Whittier
Quiet and calm without a fear,
Of danger darkly lurking near,
The weary laborer left his plough,
The milkmaid carolled by her cow;
From cottage door and household hearth
Rose songs of praise, or tones of mirth.
Centennial
© John Hay
A hundred times the bells of Brown
Have rung to sleep the idle summers,
And still to-day clangs clamoring down
A greeting to the welcome comers.
Hudibras: Part 3 - Canto I
© Samuel Butler
But she, who well enough knew what
(Before he spoke) he would be at,
Pretended not to apprehend
The mystery of what he mean'd;.
And therefore wish'd him to expound
His dark expressions, less profound.
Sleep
© James Weldon Johnson
O Sleep, thou kindest minister to man,
Silent distiller of the balm of rest,
How wonderful thy power, when naught else can,
To soothe the torn and sorrow-laden breast!
The Gathering of the Brown-Eyed
© Henry Lawson
THE BROWN EYES came from Asia, where all mystery is true,
Ere the masters of Soul Secrets dreamed of hazel, grey, and blue;
And the Brown Eyes came to Egypt, which is called the gypsies home,
And the Brown Eyes went from Egypt and Jerusalem to Rome.
The Columbiad: Book IV
© Joel Barlow
Yet must we mark, the bondage of the mind
Spreads deeper glooms, and subj ugates mankind;
The zealots fierce, whom local creeds enrage,
In holy feuds perpetual combat wage,
Support all crimes by full indulgence given,
Usurp the power and wield the sword of heaven,
Love
© Percy Bysshe Shelley
Why is it said thou canst not live
In a youthful breast and fair,
Since thou eternal life canst give,
Canst bloom for ever there?
Spirit And Star.
© James Brunton Stephens
THROUGH the bleak cold voids, through the wilds of space,
Trackless and starless, forgotten of grace,
Greeks
© Gamaliel Bradford
You really can't imagine how I love the ancient Greeks.
I love the dancing language where their mobile spirit speaks.
I love the songs of Homer, flowing on like streams of light,
With a touch of human kindness in the splendid shock of fight.
Lady That Hast my Heart
© Shams al-Din Hafiz
And ever, since the time that Hafiz heard
His Lady's voice, as from a rocky hill
Reverberates the softly spoken word,
So echoes of desire his bosom fill.
The Enchanted Mirror
© Paul Hamilton Hayne
Lords, ladies, gazed! the prospect pleased them well;
"Ah, heavens!" they sighed, "how irresistible!"
E'en the coarse hag, foul, wrinkled, and unclean,
Beamed like a blushing virgin of sixteen.
Hymn XXIII: Extended on a Cursed Tree
© Charles Wesley
Extended on a cursed tree,
Besmeared with dust, and sweat, and blood,
See there, the king of glory see!
Sinks and expires the Son of God.
Tale VI
© George Crabbe
need,
For habit told when all things should proceed;
Few their amusements, but when friends appear'd,
They with the world's distress their spirits
Madrigal #2.
© Robert Crawford
Because our life is brief
Let us laugh!
Because for joy and grief
We may quaff
The Cheval-Glass
© Thomas Hardy
Why do you harbour that great cheval-glass
Filling up your narrow room?
You never preen or plume,
Or look in a week at your full-length figure -
Picture of bachelor gloom!
The Egyptian Lotus (In an Artificial Pond)
© Arthur Wentworth Hamilton Eaton
PROUD, languid lily of the sacred Nile,
'Tis strange to see thee on our western wave,
Far from those sandy shores that mile on mile,
Papyrus-plumed, stretch silent as the grave.
Finisterre
© Sylvia Plath
This was the land's end: the last fingers, knuckled and rheumatic,
Cramped on nothing. Black
