Classic Poem

At the end of the lane of joy and pain,
We come to the little gate;
The king and the clown, and the court go down
Through its portals soon or late;
The peasant, the peer, the sage, and the seer
Depart when the day comes round,
With a muffled cry and a last good-by,
Out through the gate in the ground.

Tis fix'd by fate, we must pass the clay gate,
Little clay gate in the ground,
At the end of our ways of nights and days,
'Tis marked by a grassy mound;
We bend o'er the bier with a sob and tear,
And the still lips give no sound;
We never can know where God's gardens grow,
But through the gate in the ground.