Classic Poem

Sit down beside me,—thou, who hast left so lately
The calm dark regions, for this fretful world,—
Come back to sorrow, like the unthinking bird
Who seeks once more its cage! Sit down beside me;
And tell me what dim dreams have fallen on thee,
And what blank aspects and unbodied things
Thou met'st, in thy pale march! Didst thou not see
The—Dead? Methinks, I saw them, once! Some were there
By their own serpent passions stung to death;
Some whom too little love, or too much care,
Made white as winter; pining skeletons,
Whom hunger turned to stone; mad parents,—oh!
Who watched, for aye, some little corse—in vain;
A ghastly brotherhood, who hung together,
Knit firm by misery or some common wrong!