Classic Poem

I.

We ask no flowers to deck thy tomb;
Thy name, in purer light, shall bloom,
When every flower of earth is dead,
And all that bloom below are fled.

To thee the light of mind was given,
The centre of thy soul was heaven;
In early youth, the spirit came,
And wrapped thee in its wings of flame.

The lambent light that round thee flowed
Rose to its high and bright abode,
And bore thy restless eye afar,
To read the fate of sun and star.

Fain would we think the chain is broke,
That bound thy spirit to its yoke;
That now no mist of earth can blind
Thy bright, thy pure, and perfect mind.

Thy grave is on a foreign strand,
Thy tomb is in a distant land,
No kinsman came, no friend was near,
To close thine eye, and deck thy bier.

But friends will gather round thy tomb,
And long lament thy early doom,
And thither Science oft repair,
To plant her choicest laurels there.

II.

The brightest blossom soonest dies,
The purest dew will early rise
To mingle with the viewless air;
The fairest rose will soon decay,
The softest beauty pass away,
And all be dark and lonely there.

The brightest souls are soonest gone,
The proudest race is quickest won,
And genius finds, in youth, a grave;
The hand that sent it from above
Recalls it in its fondest love,
And takes the choicest gift it gave.

Mind cannot linger long below,
And keep unstained its virgin snow;
Earth will assert its base control:
Happy the life that soon is o'er, —
Pain ne'er can bow the spirit more,
No force can crush the tender soul.

A few short years, but oh! how bright
With pure, serene and mellow light, —
No hour, no moment spent in vain.
Better, than base eternity,
To live these transient years, like thee,
In light, and die without a stain.