 | A book of Bristol sonnets |  |
59
THE MONUMENT AT DUCHESS' WOODS,
ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF LADY ELIZABETH'S DEATH.
Lady Elizabeth, my lot be thine!In children's hearts my immortalities!
A presence with the bluebells 'mid the trees;
A cool green pillar set in rain and shine!
Or with those mild conservators, the kine,
Who tend the grass, and keep the terraces!
A memory in these chestnuts, with the breeze
That shifts their branchy cavern shades, be mine.
All these about thy pillar, noble dame,
Climb with the ivy of a hundred years!
This cannot yet efface thy sculptured name;
These cannot yet forbid our grateful tears;
With them, to thee, on this thy death's sad day,
True genius of the place, our floral vows we pay.
| A book of Bristol sonnets | |