The Clocks Of Death

In a life where the clocks
Are slow or fast,
It is a pleasant thing
To die together
As we are dying.

From the Japanese of the Wife of Bes-syo Ko-saburo Naga-haru, (sixteenth century).

Edward Powys Mathers

Edward Powys Mathers was an English translator and poet, best known for translating the French Orientalist J.C. Mardrus's translation of 'The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night' in 1923. In addition to translations, Powys Mathers was an influential figure in the realm of cryptic crosswords, devising some of the most challenging puzzles for 'The Observer'. His translations have been lauded for their literary beauty and for introducing English-speaking audiences to classic Persian, Arabic, and Turkish poetry.

Edward Powys Mathers

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Time And Death And Love.

Last night I watched for Death -
So sick of life was I! -
When in the street beneath
I heard his watchman cry
The hour, while passing by.

I called. And in the night
I heard him stop below,
His owlish lanthorn's light
Blurring the windy snow -
How long the time and slow!

I said, Why dost thou cower
There at my door and knock?
Come in! It is the hour!
Cease fumbling at the lock!
Naught's well! 'Tis no o'clock!

Black through the door with him
Swept in the Winter's breath;
His cloak was great and grim -
But he, who smiled beneath,
Had the face of Love not Death.

Madison Julius Cawein

The Clock-Winder

It is dark as a cave,
Or a vault in the nave
When the iron door
Is closed, and the floor
Of the church relaid
With trowel and spade.

But the parish-clerk
Cares not for the dark
As he winds in the tower
At a regular hour
The rheumatic clock,
Whose dilatory knock
You can hear when praying
At the day's decaying,
Or at any lone while
From a pew in the aisle.

Up, up from the ground
Around and around
In the turret stair
He clambers, to where
The wheelwork is,
With its tick, click, whizz,
Reposefully measuring
Each day to its end
That mortal men spend
In sorrowing and pleasuring
Nightly thus does he climb
To the trackway of Time.

Him I followed one night
To this place without light,

Thomas Hardy

The Clock Of The Years

"A spirit passed before my face; the hair of my flesh stood up."

And the Spirit said,
"I can make the clock of the years go backward,
But am loth to stop it where you will."
And I cried, "Agreed
To that. Proceed:
It's better than dead!"

He answered, "Peace";
And called her up - as last before me;
Then younger, younger she freshed, to the year
I first had known
Her woman-grown,
And I cried, "Cease! -

"Thus far is good -
It is enough - let her stay thus always!"
But alas for me. He shook his head:
No stop was there;
And she waned child-fair,
And to babyhood.

Still less in mien
To my great sorrow became she slowly,
And smalled till she was nought at all
In his checkless griff;
And it was as if
She ha...

Thomas Hardy

The Death-Bed.[1]

We watch'd her breathing through the night.
Her breathing soft and low,
As in her breast the wave of life
Kept heaving to and fro.

So silently we seem'd to speak,
So slowly moved about,
As we had lent her half our powers
To eke her living out.

Our very hopes belied our fears,
Our fears our hopes belied -
We thought her dying when she slept,
And sleeping when she died.

For when the morn came dim and sad,
And chill with early showers,
Her quiet eyelids closed - she had
Another morn than ours.

Thomas Hood

The House Of Dust: Part 02: 10: Sudden Death

Number four, the girl who died on the table,
The girl with golden hair,
The purpling body lies on the polished marble.
We open the throat, and lay the thyroid bare . . .

One, who held the ether-cone, remembers
Her dark blue frightened eyes.
He heard the sharp breath quiver, and saw her breast
More hurriedly fall and rise.
Her hands made futile gestures, she turned her head
Fighting for breath; her cheeks were flushed to scarlet,
And, suddenly, she lay dead.

And all the dreams that hurried along her veins
Came to the darkness of a sudden wall.
Confusion ran among them, they whirled and clamored,
They fell, they rose, they struck, they shouted,
Till at last a pallor of silence hushed them all.

What was her name? Where had she walked that morn...

Conrad Aiken

Death And The Dying.

^[1]

Death never taketh by surprise
The well-prepared, to wit, the wise -
They knowing of themselves the time
To meditate the final change of clime.
That time, alas! embraces all
Which into hours and minutes we divide;
There is no part, however small,
That from this tribute one can hide.
The very moment, oft, which bids
The heirs of empire see the light
Is that which shuts their fringèd lids
In everlasting night.
Defend yourself by rank and wealth,
Plead beauty, virtue, youth, and health, -
Unblushing Death will ravish all;
The world itself shall pass beneath his pall.
No truth is better known; but, truth to say,
No truth is oftener thrown away.

A man, well in his second century,
Complain'd that Death had call'd him su...

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