Classic Poem

There is a tear for all that die,
 A mourner o'er the humblest grave;
But nations swell the funeral cry,
 And Triumph weeps above the brave.

For them is Sorrow's purest sigh
 O'er Ocean's heaving bosom sent:
In vain their bones unburied lie,
 All earth becomes their monument!

A tomb is theirs on every page,
 An epitaph on every tongue:
The present hours, the future age,
 For them bewail, to them belong.

For them the voice of festal mirth
 Grows hush'd, their name the only sound;
While deep Remembrance pours to Worth
 The goblet's tributary round.

A theme to crowds that knew them not,
 Lamented by admiring foes,
Who would not share their glorious lot?
 Who would not die the death they chose?

And, gallant Parker! thus enshrined
 Thy life, thy fall, thy fame shall be;
And early valour, glowing, find
 A model in thy memory.

But there are breasts that bleed with thee
 In woe, that glory cannot quell;
And shuddering hear of victory,
 Where one so dear, so dauntless, fell.

Where shall they turn to mourn thee less?
 When cease to hear thy cherish'd name?
Time cannot teach forgetfulness,
 While Grief's full heart is fed by Fame.

Alas! for them, though not for thee,
 They cannot choose but weep the more;
Deep for the dead the grief must be,
 Who ne'er gave cause to mourn before.
   October 7, 1814.