Oh! why should I live to hear music resounding,
Which cannot awake ye, my lovely, my brave?
Why smile the waste flowers, my sad footsteps surrounding?
—My sons! they but clothe the green turf of your grave!
Alone on the rocks of the stranger I linger,
My spirit all wrapt in the past, as a dream!
Mine ear hath no joy in the voice of the singer,*[1]
Mine eye sparkles not to the sunlight's glad beam,
Yet, yet I live on, though forsaken and weeping!
—Oh Grave! why refuse to the aged thy bed,
When valour's high heart on thy bosom is sleeping,
When youth's glorious flower is gone down to the dead!
Fair were ye, my sons! and all kingly your bearing,
As on to the fields of your glory ye trod!
- ↑
* "What I loved when I was a youth is hateful to me now.
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