 | Sonnets |  |
XXXIX
ON A MONUMENT WITH THE FIGURES OF HOPE AND CONTEMPLATION.
Yes, it is fit Carrara's regal stoneWith imaged thought should rise above the dead;
Or softly bow with pale ideal head,
Like cherished sorrow into beauty grown:
These are the forms that joy can look upon,
And then beyond them, like an angel sped;
Lovest thou rather the material bed
Of earthy death—or else—oblivion?
There was no death for that rejoicing spirit,
There should be no oblivion, gaze, so may
Noble and pure perchance thine own become:
Of one in heaven, who on the earth was near it,
The record this; but nothing doth it say;
For Hope and Contemplation both are dumb.
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