Burial Stones

In the dewy depths of the graveyard
    I lie in the tangled grass,
And watch, in the sea of azure,
    The white cloud-islands pass.

The birds in the rustling branches
    Sing gaily overhead;
Grey stones like sentinel spectres
    Are guarding the silent dead.

The early flowers sleep shaded
    In the cool green noonday glooms;
The broken light falls shuddering
    On the cold white face of the tombs.

Without, the world is smiling
    In the infinite love of God,
But the sunlight fails and falters
    When it falls on the churchyard sod.

On me the joyous rapture
    Of a heart's first love is shed,
But it falls on my heart as coldly
    As sunlight on the dead.

'Tis a bleak wild hill, but green and bright
In the summer warmth and the mid-day light;
There's the hum of the bee and the chirp of the wren,
And the dash of the brook from the alder glen;
There's the sound of a bell from the scattered flock,
And the shade of the beech lies cool on the rock,
And fresh from the west is the free wind's breath,
There is nothing here that speaks of death.

Far yonder, where orchards and gardens lie,
And dwellings cluster, 'tis there men die.
They are born, they die, and are buried near,
Where the populous grave-yard lightens the bier;
For strict and close are the ties that bind
In death the children of human-kind;
Yea, stricter and closer than those of life,
'Tis a neighbourhood that knows no strife.
They are noiselessly gat...

A wall of crumbling stones doth keep
Watch o'er long barrows where they sleep,
Old chronicled grave-stones of its dead,
On which oblivious mosses creep
And lichens gray as lead.

Warm days the lost cows as they pass
Rest here and browse the juicy grass
That springs about its sun-scorched stones;
Afar one hears their bells' deep brass
Waft melancholy tones.

Here the wild morning-glory goes
A-rambling as the myrtle grows,
Wild morning-glories pale as pain,
With holy urns, that hint at woes,
The night hath filled with rain.

Here are blackberries largest seen,
Rich, winey dark, whereon the lean
Black hornet sucks, noons sick with heat,
That bend not to the shadowed green
The heavy bearded wheat.

At dark, for its forgotten...

Our ancient church! its lowly tower,
Beneath the loftier spire,
Is shadowed when the sunset hour
Clothes the tall shaft in fire;
It sinks beyond the distant eye
Long ere the glittering vane,
High wheeling in the western sky,
Has faded o'er the plain.

Like Sentinel and Nun, they keep
Their vigil on the green;
One seems to guard, and one to weep,
The dead that lie between;
And both roll out, so full and near,
Their music's mingling waves,
They shake the grass, whose pennoned spear
Leans on the narrow graves.

The stranger parts the flaunting weeds,
Whose seeds the winds have strown
So thick, beneath the line he reads,
They shade the sculptured stone;
The child unveils his clustered brow,
And ponders for a while
The graven...

Erewhile, on England's pleasant shores, our sires
Left not their churchyards unadorned with shades
Or blossoms; and indulgent to the strong
And natural dread of man's last home, the grave,
Its frost and silence, they disposed around,
To soothe the melancholy spirit that dwelt
Too sadly on life's close, the forms and hues
Of vegetable beauty. There the yew,
Green even amid the snows of winter, told
Of immortality, and gracefully
The willow, a perpetual mourner, drooped;
And there the gadding woodbine crept about,
And there the ancient ivy. From the spot
Where the sweet maiden, in her blossoming years
Cut off, was laid with streaming eyes, and hands
That trembled as they placed her there, the rose
Sprung modest, on bowed stalk, and better spoke
Her graces, ...

It is the spot I came to seek,
My fathers' ancient burial-place
Ere from these vales, ashamed and weak,
Withdrew our wasted race.
It is the spot, I know it well,
Of which our old traditions tell.

For here the upland bank sends out
A ridge toward the river-side;
I know the shaggy hills about,
The meadows smooth and wide,
The plains, that, toward the southern sky,
Fenced east and west by mountains lie.

A white man, gazing on the scene,
Would say a lovely spot was here,
And praise the lawns, so fresh and green,
Between the hills so sheer.
I like it not, I would the plain
Lay in its tall old groves again.

The sheep are on the slopes around,
The cattle in the meadows feed,
And labourers turn the crumbling ground,
Or drop t...