Classic Poem

The sunset gold was fading from the sky,
The cypresses towered darkly overhead,
While through the deepening shade a pathway led
To where the bones of England's poet lie.
We heard the night-wind in the tall trees sigh,
Yet, as we stooped and on the white stone read
Those lines which tell the heart's woe of the dead,
Something that was not darkness blurred the eye.

" Whose name was writ in water," — yea, 'twas so.
O passionate soul of beauty, youth and light,
Thy name is writ in water, earth and air,
It sings in birds' songs, scents all flowers that blow,
Lights up the forest glade, crowns the starred night;
Thy epitaph was triumph, not despair.