What beckoning ghost, along the
moonlight shade |
Invites my step, and points to yonder
glade? |
’Tis she!—but why that bleeding bosom
gored, |
Why dimly gleams the visionary sword? |
Oh ever beauteous, ever friendly! tell, |
Is it, in heaven, a crime to love too
well? |
To bear too tender, or too firm a
heart, |
To act a lover’s or a Roman’s part? |
Is there no bright reversion in the
sky, |
For those who greatly think, or bravely
die? |
Why bade ye
else, ye powers! her soul aspire |
Above the vulgar flight of low desire? |
Ambition first sprung from your blessed
abodes; |
The glorious fault of angels and of
gods: |
Thence to their images on earth it
flows, |
And in the breasts of kings and heroes
glows, |
Most souls, ’tis true, but peep out
once an age, |
Dull sullen prisoners in the body’s
cage: |
Dim lights of life, that burn a length
of years |
Useless, unseen, as lamps in
sepulchres; |
Like eastern kings a lazy state they
keep, |
And close confined in their own palace
sleep. |
From these
perhaps (ere nature bade her die) |
Fate snatched her early to the pitying
sky. |
As into air the purer spirits flow, |
And separate from their kindred dregs
below; |
So flew the soul to its congenial
place, |
Nor left one virtue to redeem her race. |
But thou,
false guardian of a charge too good, |
Thou, mean deserter of thy brother’s
blood! |
See on these ruby lips the trembling
breath, |
These cheeks, now fading at the blast
of death; |
Cold is that breast which warmed the
world before, |
And those love-darting eyes must roll
no more. |
Thus, if eternal justice rules the
ball, |
Thus shall your wives, and thus your
children fall: |
On all the line a sudden vengeance
waits, |
And frequent hearses shall besiege your
gates. |
There passengers shall stand, and
pointing say, |
(While the long funerals blacken all
the way) |
‘Lo these were they, whose souls the
Furies steeled, |
And cursed with hearts unknowing how to
yield. |
Thus unlamented pass the proud away,
|
The gaze of fools, and pageant of a
day! |
So perish all, whose breast ne’er
learned to glow |
For others good, or melt at others
woe.’ |
What can atone
(oh ever-injured shade!) |
Thy fate unpitied, and thy rites
unpaid? |
No friend’s complaint, no kind domestic
tear |
Pleased thy pale ghost, or graced thy
mournful bier; |
By foreign hands thy dying eyes were
closed, |
By foreign hands thy decent limbs
composed, |
By foreign hands thy humble grave
adorned, |
By strangers honoured, and by strangers
mourned! |
What though no friends in sable weeds
appear, |
Grieve for an hour, perhaps, then mourn
a year, |
And bear about the mockery of woe |
To midnight dances, and the public
show? |
What though no weeping loves thy ashes
grace, |
Nor polished marble emulate thy face? |
What though no sacred earth allow thee
room, |
Nor hallowed dirge be muttered o’er thy
tomb? |
Yet shall thy grave with rising flowers
be dressed, |
And the green turf lie lightly on thy
breast: |
There shall the morn her earliest tears
bestow, |
There the first roses of the year shall
blow; |
While angels with their silver wings
o’ershade |
The ground, now sacred by thy relics
made. |
So peaceful
rests, without a stone, a name, |
What once had beauty, titles, wealth,
and fame. |
How loved, how honoured once, avails
thee not, |
To whom related, or by whom begot; |
A heap of dust alone remains of thee; |
’Tis all thou art, and all the proud
shall be! |
Poets
themselves must fall, like those they sung; |
Deaf the praised ear, and mute the
tuneful tongue. |
Ev’n he, whose soul now melts in
mournful lays, |
Shall shortly want the generous tear he
pays; |
Then from his closing eyes thy form
shall part, |
And the last pang shall tear thee from
his heart, |
Life’s idle business at one gasp be
o’er, |
The Muse forgot, and thou beloved no
more!
|
Alexander Pope
| Classic Poems |
|
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