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Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard | Poems about Death · Ririro.com - Poetry

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  Speaker 1: The curfew tolls the knell of parting day. The lowing
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  Speaker 1: herd winds slowly o'er the lea. The plowman homeward plods
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  Speaker 1: his weary way, and leaves the world to darkness, And
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  Speaker 1: to me now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight
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  Speaker 1: and all the air, a solemn stillness holds, save where
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  Speaker 1: the beetle wheels his drowning flight, and drowsy tinklings lull
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  Speaker 1: the distant folds, Save that from yonder ivy mantled tower
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  Speaker 1: the moping owl does to the moon complain of such
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  Speaker 1: as wandering near her secret bower, molest her ancient solitary rain.
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  Speaker 1: Beneath those rugged elms, that yew trees shed, where heaves
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  Speaker 1: the turf in many a moldering heap, each in his
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  Speaker 1: narrow cell, for ever laid the rude forefathers of the
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  Speaker 1: hamlets sleep the breezy call of incense breathing morn, the
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  Speaker 1: swallow twittering from the straw built shed, the cock's shrill clarion,
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  Speaker 1: or the echoing horn no more shall rouse them from
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  Speaker 1: their lowly bed. For them, no more the blazing hearth
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  Speaker 1: shall burn, or busy housewife ply her evening care. No
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  Speaker 1: children run to lisp their sire's return, or climb his
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  Speaker 1: knees the envied kiss to sheer oft did the harvest
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  Speaker 1: to their sickle, yield their fur or oft the stubborn
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  Speaker 1: glebe has broke? How jocund did they drive their team afield?
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  Speaker 1: How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke. Let not
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  Speaker 1: ambition mock their useful toil, their homely joys and destiny
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  Speaker 1: obscure nor grandeur. Here with a disdainful smile, the short
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  Speaker 1: and simple annals of the poor, The boast of heraldry,
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  Speaker 1: the pomp of power, and all that beauty, all that
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  Speaker 1: wealth e'er gave await alike the inevitable hour. The paths
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  Speaker 1: of glory lead but to the grave. Nor you ye proud,
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  Speaker 1: impute to these the fault if memory o'er their tomb,
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  Speaker 1: No trophies raise. Where through the long drawn aisle and
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  Speaker 1: fretted vault of the pealing anthem swells the note of
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  Speaker 1: praise can storied urn or animated bust back to its
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  Speaker 1: mansion coal The fleeting breath, can honor's voice provoke the
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  Speaker 1: silent dust, or flattery soothe the dull cold ear of death.
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  Speaker 1: Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid some hot once
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  Speaker 1: pregnant with celestial fire, hands, that the rod of empire
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  Speaker 1: might have swayed or waked to ecstasy the living lyre.
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  Speaker 1: But knowledge to their eyes, her ample page, rich with
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  Speaker 1: the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll, chill, penury, repressed
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  Speaker 1: their noble rage, and froze the genial current of the soul. Full,
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  Speaker 1: Many a gem of purest ray serene. The dark, unfathomed
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  Speaker 1: caves of ocean bear full. Many a flower is borne
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  Speaker 1: to blush unseen, and waste its sweetness on the desert air.
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  Speaker 1: Some village Hampden, that with daunt thus breast the little
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  Speaker 1: tyrant of his fields withstood some mute inglorious Milton. Here
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  Speaker 1: may rest some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood. The
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  Speaker 1: plows of listening senates to command the threats of pain
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  Speaker 1: and ruin, to despise, to scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
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  Speaker 1: and read their history in a nation's eyes. Their lot
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  Speaker 1: for bad nor circumscribed alone their growing virtues, but their
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  Speaker 1: crimes confined. For bad. To wade through slaughter to a
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  Speaker 1: throne and shut the gates of mercy on mankind, the
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  Speaker 1: struggling pangs of conscious truth, to hide, to quench the
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  Speaker 1: blushes of ingenuous shame, or heap the shrine of luxury
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  Speaker 1: and pride, with incense kindled at the muse's flame, far
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  Speaker 1: from the madding crowd's ignoble strife. Their sober wishes never
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  Speaker 1: learned to stray along the cool, sequestered vale of life.
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  Speaker 1: They kept the noiseless tenor of their way. Yet even
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  Speaker 1: these bones from insult to protect some frail memorials, still
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  Speaker 1: erected nigh with uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture decked implores
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  Speaker 1: the passing tribute of a sigh, their name, their years
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  Speaker 1: spelt by th unlettered muse, the place of fame and elegy, supply,
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  Speaker 1: and many a holy text around she strews that teach
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  Speaker 1: the rustic moralist to die for who to dumb forgetfulness
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  Speaker 1: of prey. This pleasing, anxious being air resigned left the
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  Speaker 1: warm precincts of the cheerful day, nor cast one longing,
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  Speaker 1: lingering look behind on some fond breast. The parting soul
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  Speaker 1: relies some pious drops the closing eye requires even from
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  Speaker 1: the tomb, The voice of nature cries, Even in our
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  Speaker 1: ashes live their wonted fires. For thee who mindful of
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  Speaker 1: thun honor dead, dost in these lines thy artless tale.
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  Speaker 1: Relate if chance, by lonely contemplation led some kindred spiritual
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  Speaker 1: inquire thy fate. Haply some hoary headed swain, may say, Oft,
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  Speaker 1: have we seen him at the peep of dawn, brushing
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  Speaker 1: with hasty steps the dews away to meet the sun
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  Speaker 1: upon the upland lawn. There at the foot of yonder
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  Speaker 1: nodding beech that wreathes its old fantastic roots so high
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  Speaker 1: his listless length. At noontide would he stretch and pour
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  Speaker 1: upon the brook that babbles by hoard by yon wood,
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  Speaker 1: Now smiling as in scorn, muttering his wayward fancies. He
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  Speaker 1: would rove now drooping woful wan, like one forlorn, or
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  Speaker 1: crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless love. One morning
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  Speaker 1: I missed him on the customed hill, along the heath,
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  Speaker 1: and near his favorite tree. Another came. Nor yet beside
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  Speaker 1: the rill, nor up the lawn, nor at the wood.
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  Speaker 1: Was he the next, with Dirgey's dew in sad array,
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  Speaker 1: slow through the churchway path we saw him born, Approach
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  Speaker 1: and read, for thou canst read the lay gray on
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  Speaker 1: the stone beneath Yon aged thorn the epitaph here rests
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  Speaker 1: his head upon the lap of earth, a youth to
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  Speaker 1: fortune and to fame unknown. Fair science frowned not on
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  Speaker 1: his humble birth, and melancholy marked him for her own.
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  Speaker 1: Large was his bounty and his soul, sincere heaven did
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  Speaker 1: her recompense as largely send he gave to misery. All
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  Speaker 1: he had, a tear he gained from heaven, twas all
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  Speaker 1: he wished a friend. No father seek his merits to
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  Speaker 1: disclose or draw his frailties from their dread abode, though
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  Speaker 1: they alike in trembling Hope repose the bosom of his
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  Speaker 1: father and his God,