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A THOUGHT BY THE SEA-SHORE.
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A THOUGHT BY THE SEA-SHORE.

“Even in our ashes live their wonted fires.”


    Bury me by the sea,
When on my heart the hand of Death is press’d.
If the soul lingers ere she join the bless’d,
    And haunts awhile her clay,
Then ’mid the forest shades I would not lie,
For the green leaves, like me, would droop and die.

    Nor ’mid the homes of men,
The haunts of busy life, would I be laid:
There ever was I lone, and my vexed shade
    Would sleep unquiet then:
The surging tide of life might overwhelm
The shadowy boundaries of the silent realm.

    No sculptured marble pile,
To bear my name, be reared upon my breast,—
Beneath its weight my free soul would not rest:
    But let the blue sky smile,