Elegy on Thyrza

　　AND thou art dead as young and fair

　　As aught of mortal birth;

　　And form so soft and charms so rare

　　Too soon return'd to Earth!

　　Though Earth received them in her bed

　　And o'er the spot the crowd may tread

　　In carelessness or mirth

　　There is an eye which could not brook

　　A moment on that grave to look.

　　I will not ask where thou liest low

　　Nor gaze upon the spot;

　　There flowers or weeds at will may grow

　　So I behold them not：

　　It is enough for me to prove

　　That what I loved and long must love

　　Like common earth can rot;

　　To me there needs no stone to tell

　　'Tis Nothing that I loved so well.

　　Yet did I love thee to the last

　　As fervently as thou

　　Who didst not change through all the past

　　And canst not alter now.

　　The love where Death has set his seal

　　Nor age can chill nor rival steal

　　Nor falsehood disavow;

　　And what were worse thou canst not see

　　Or wrong or change or fault in me.

　　The better days of life were ours

　　The worst can be but mine;

　　The sun that cheers the storm that lours

　　Shall never more be thine.

　　The silence of that dreamless sleep

　　I envy now too much to weep;

　　Nor need I to repine

　　That all those charms have pass'd away

　　I might have watch'd through long decay.

　　The flower in ripen'd bloom unmatch'd

　　Must fall the earliest prey;

　　Though by no hand untimely snatch'd.

　　The leaves must drop away.

　　And yet it were a greater grief

　　To watch it withering leaf by leaf

　　Than see it pluck'd to-day;

　　Since earthly eye but ill can bear

　　To trace the change to foul from fair.

　　I know not if I could have borne

　　To see thy beauties fade;

　　The night that follow'd such a morn

　　Had worn a deeper shade.

　　Thy day without a cloud hath pass'd

　　And thou wert lovely to the last

　　Extinguish'd not decay'd;

　　As stars that shoot along the sky

　　Shine brightest as they fall from high.

　　As once I wept if I could weep

　　My tears might well be shed

　　To think I was not near to keep

　　One vigil o'er thy bed—

　　To gaze how fondly! on thy face

　　To fold thee in a faint embrace

　　Uphold thy drooping head

　　And show that love however vain

　　Nor thou nor I can feel again.

　　Yet how much less it were to gain

　　Though thou hast left me free

　　The loveliest things that still remain

　　Than thus remember thee!

　　The all of thine that cannot die

　　Through dark and dread eternity

　　Returns again to me

　　And more thy buried love endears

　　Than aught except its living years.