THE DEATH-BED.
We watched 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 seemed 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.
A DEATH-BED.
Her suffering ended with the day;
Yet lived she at its close,
And breathed the long, long night away,
In statue-like repose.
But when the sun, in all his state,
Illumed the eastern skies,
She passed through glory's morning-gate,
And walked in Paradise!
JAMES ALDRICH.
REQUIESCAT.
Strew on her roses, roses,
And never a spray of yew.
In quiet she reposes:
Ah! would that I did too.
Her mirth the world required:
She bathed it in smiles of glee.
But her heart was tired, tired,
And now they let her be.
Her life was turning, turning,
In mazes of heat and sound.
But for peace her soul was yearning,
And now peace laps her round.
Her cabined, ample Spirit,
It fluttered and failed for breath.
To-night it doth inherit
The vasty Hall of Death.
MATTHEW ARNOLD.
"THE UNILLUMINED VERGE."
TO A FRIEND DYING.
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