Sketches from Life in Dixie | ||
TO A FLOWER ON A CORPSE.
Ah, thou beautiful embellishment of earth,By dew, and rain, and dutiful spring hurled,
A thing of loveliness, into this world
Of woe, and discord, and the cruel dearth
That blights our desires, and turns our hearth
Into a charnel house; nor king, nor earl,
Nor wit, can provoke the sad heart to mirth,
Where our hopes all end and our colors furl.
Fit emblem of man's transient stage art thou;
This morn beheld thee delightfully fair,
Full of fragrance, pleasingly sweet; but now,
This eve, thy withered form sleeps on the prow
Of that barque grim Death is launching out there,
In the omnivorous sea of dispair.
Sketches from Life in Dixie | ||