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    Oh, never shall a careless tread
    Soil with its step thy sacred bed!
    Never shall leaf or blossom bloom
    With vainest mockery o'er thy tomb!

        And forth I went, and raised a shrine
    Of the dried branches of the pine,—
    I laid her there, and o'er her flung
    The wild flowers that around her sprung;
    I tore them up, and root and all,
    I bade them wait her funeral,
    With a strange joy that each fair thing
    Should, like herself, be withering.
    I lit the pyre,—the evening skies
    Rain'd tears upon the sacrifice;
    How did its wild and awful light
    Struggle with the fierce winds of night;