Classic Poem

Life may not perish though the winds of death
Whine shrilly through the world, where we alone
Crouch in the trodden dust, and feel the moan
Of ancient sorrow burthening our breath.
The blade endureth, though it break the sheath;
Life springs and ceases in oblivion,
Gathered and scattered by the master sun
Like rain upon the waters calm beneath.
We wait like corpses in a charnel-house,
And singly, as the shrouded years return,
They loose the cere-cloth on our furrowed brows;
And one departs in splendour through the tomb,
We hear the voice of Cherubim, and turn
Weeping like children in the intenser gloom.