A violet bed is budding near, Wherein a lark has made her nest: And good they are, but not the best; And dear they are, but not so dear.
Some are laughing, some are weeping; She is sleeping, only sleeping. Round her rest wild flowers are creeping; There the wind is heaping, heaping Sweetest sweets of Summer's keeping, By the cornfields ripe for reaping.
There are lilies, and there blushes The deep rose, and there the thrushes Sing till latest sunlight flushes In the west; a fresh wind brushes Through the leaves while evening hushes.
There by day the lark is singing And the grass and weeds are springing: There by night the bat is winging; There forever winds are bringing Far-off chimes of church-bells ringing.
Night and morning, noon and even, Their sound fills her dreams with Heaven: The long strife at length is striven: Till her grave-bands shall be riven Such is the good portion given To her soul at rest and shriven.
She sat and sang alway By the green margin of a stream, Watching the fishes leap and play Beneath the glad sunbeam.
I sat and wept alway Beneath the moon's most shadowy beam, Watching the blossoms of the May Weep leaves into the stream.
I wept for memory; She sang for hope that is so fair: My tears were swallowed by the sea; Her songs died on the air.
When I am dead, my dearest, Sing no sad songs for me; Plant thou no roses at my head, Nor shady cypress-tree: Be the green grass above me With showers and dewdrops wet; And if thou wilt, remember, And if thou wilt, forget.
I shall not see the shadows, I shall not feel the rain; I shall not hear the nightingale Sing on, as if in pain: And dreaming through the twilight That doth not rise nor set, Haply I may remember, And haply may forget.
Ah! changed and cold, how changed and very cold! With stiffened smiling lips and cold calm eyes: Changed, yet the same; much knowing, little wise; _This_ was the promise of the days of old! Grown hard and stubborn in the ancient mould, Grown rigid in the sham of lifelong lies: We hoped for better things as years would rise, But it is over as a tale once told. All fallen the blossom that no fruitage bore, All lost the present and the future time, All lost, all lost, the lapse that went before: So lost till death shut-to the opened door, So lost from chime to everlasting chime, So cold and lost forever evermore.
