The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Margaret Chandler/The Sylvan Grave
The Sylvan Grave edit
Lay me not, when I die, in the place of the dead,
With the dwellings of men round my resting place spread,
But amidst the still forest, unseen and alone,
Where the waters go by with a murmuring tone;
Where the wild bird above me may wave its dark wing,
And the flowers I have loved from my ashes may spring;
Where affection's own blossom may lift its blue eye,
With an eloquent glance from the place where I lie.
Let the rose and the woodbine be there, to enwreath
A bright chaplet of bloom for the pale brow of death;
And the clover's red blossom be seen, that the hum
Of the honey-bee's wing, may for requiem come:
And when those I have loved, ‘midst the changes of earth,
The clouds of its sorrow, its sunshine of mirth,
Shall visit the spot where my cold relics lie,
And gaze on its flowers with a tear-moisten'd eye—
Let them think that my spirit still sometimes is there,
My breath the light zephyr that twines in their hair,
And these flowers, in their fragrance, a memory be,
To tell them thus sweet was their friendship to me.