COME not, when I am dead, To drop thy foolish tears upon my grave, To trample round my fallen head, And vex the unhappy dust thou would'st not save. There let the wind sweep and the plover cry; But thou, go by. Child, if it were thine error or thy crime, Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick of Time, Pass on, weak heart, and leave me where I lie : THE EAGLE. A FRAGMENT. HE clasps the crag with hookéd hands; The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls; IN MEMORIAM. STRONG Son of God, immortal Love, By faith, and faith alone, embrace, Believing where we cannot prove! Thine are these orbs of light and shade; Thou madest Death; and lo! thy foot Thou wilt not leave us in the dust: Thou madest man, he knows not why; He thinks he was not made to die; And thou hast made him: thou art just. Thou seemest human and divine, The highest, holiest manhood, thou: Our wills are ours, we know not how; Our wills are ours, to make them thine. Our little systems have their day; They have their day and cease to be; They are but broken lights of thee, And thou, oh Lord, art more than they. We have but faith: we cannot know; A beam in darkness: let it grow. Let knowledge grow from more to more, But more of reverence in us dwell; That mind and soul, according well, May make one music, as before, But vaster. We are fools and slight; We mock thee when we do not fear: But help thy foolish ones to bear; Help thy vain worlds to bear thy light. Forgive what seemed my sin in me; Forgive my grief for one removed, Forgive these wild and wandering cries, Forgive them where they fail in truth, And in thy wisdom make me wise. 1849. |