In the village churchyard she lies,
Dust is in her beautiful eyes,
No more she breathes, nor feels, nor stirs;
At her feet and at her head
Lies a slave to attend the dead,
But their dust is white as hers.
Was she a lady of high degree,
So much in love with the vanity
And foolish pomp of this world of ours?
Or was it Christian charity,
And lowliness and humility,
The richest and rarest of all dowers?
Who shall tell us? No one speaks;
No color shoots into those cheeks,
Either of anger or of pride,
At the rude question we have asked;
Nor will the mystery be unmasked
By those who are sleeping at her side.
Hereafter?--And do you think to look
On the terrible pages of that Book
To find her failings, faults, and errors?
Ah, you will then have other cares,
In your own short-comings and despairs,
In your own secret sins and terrors!
Birds of Passage 1858
- Birds of Passage
- Prometheus, or the Poet's Forethought
- Epimetheus, or the Poet's Afterthought
- The Ladder of St. Augustine
- The Phantom Ship
- The Warden of the Cinque Ports
- Haunted Houses
- In the Churchyard at Cambridge
- The Emperor's Bird's-Nest
- The Two Angels
- Daylight and Moonlight
- The Jewish Cemetery at Newport
- Oliver Basselin
- Victor Galbraith
- My Lost Youth
- The Ropewalk
- The Golden Mile-Stone
- Catawba Wine
- Santa Filomena
- The Discoverer of the North Cape
- Daybreak
- The Fiftieth Birthday of Agassiz
- Children
- Sandalphon
- The Children's Hour
- Enceladus
- The Cumberland
- Snow-Flakes
- A Day of Sunshine
- Something Left Undone
- Weariness