| |
| STRAIT is the spot and green the sod | |
| From whence my sorrows flow; | |
| And soundly sleeps the ever dear | |
| Inhabitant below. | |
| |
| Pardon my transport, gentle shade, | 5 |
| While o’er the turf I bow; | |
| Thy earthy house is circumscrib’d, | |
| And solitary now. | |
| |
| Not one poor stone to tell thy name, | |
| Or make thy virtues known: | 10 |
| But what avails to me-to thee, | |
| The sculpture of a stone? | |
| |
| I’ll sit me down upon this turf, | |
| And wipe the rising tear: | |
| The chill blast passes swiftly by, | 15 |
| And flits around thy bier. | |
| |
| Dark is the dwelling of the Dead, | |
| And sad their house of rest: | |
| Low lies the head, by Death’s cold arms | |
| In awful fold embrac’d. | 20 |
| |
| I saw the grim Avenger stand | |
| Incessant by thy side; | |
| Unseen by thee, his deadly breath | |
| Thy lingering frame destroy’d. | |
| |
| Pale grew the roses on thy cheek, | 25 |
| And wither’d was thy bloom, | |
| Till the slow poison brought thy youth | |
| Untimely to the tomb. | |
| |
| Thus wasted are the ranks of men— | |
| Youth, Health, and Beauty fall; | 30 |
| The ruthless ruin spreads around, | |
| And overwhelms us all. | |
| |
| Behold where, round thy narrow house, | |
| The graves unnumber’d lie; | |
| The multitude that sleep below | 35 |
| Existed but to die. | |
| |
| Some, with the tottering steps of Age, | |
| Trod down the darksome way; | |
| And some, in youth’s lamented prime, | |
| Like thee were torn away: | 40 |
| |
| Yet these, however hard their fate, | |
| Their native earth receives; | |
| Amid their weeping friends they died, | |
| And fill their fathers’ graves. | |
| |
| From thy lov’d friends, when first thy heart | 45 |
| Was taught by Heav’n to glow, | |
| Far, far remov’d, the ruthless stroke | |
| Surpris’d and laid thee low. | |
| |
| At the last limits of our isle, | |
| Wash’d by the western wave, | 50 |
| Touch’d by thy face, a thoughtful bard | |
| Sits lonely by thy grave. | |
| |
| Pensive he eyes, before him spread | |
| The deep, outstretch’d and vast; | |
| His mourning notes are borne away | 55 |
| Along the rapid blast. | |
| |
| And while, amid the silent Dead | |
| Thy hapless fate he mourns, | |
| His own long sorrows freshly bleed, | |
| And all his grief returns: | 60 |
| |
| Like thee, cut off in early youth, | |
| And flower of beauty’s pride, | |
| His friend, his first and only joy, | |
| His much lov’d Stella, died. | |
| |
| Him, too, the stern impulse of Fate | 65 |
| Resistless bears along; | |
| And the same rapid tide shall whelm | |
| The Poet and the Song. | |
| |
| The tear of pity which he sheds, | |
| He asks not to receive; | 70 |
| Let but his poor remains be laid | |
| Obscurely in the grave. | |
| |
| His grief-worn heart, with truest joy, | |
| Shall meet he welcome shock: | |
| His airy harp shall lie unstrung, | 75 |
| And silent on the rock. | |
| |
| O, my dear maid, my Stella, when | |
| Shall this sick period close, | |
| And lead the solitary bard | |
| To his belov’d repose? | 80 |
| |
