Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, BURY HER WITH HER SHINING HAIR, by CATHERINE ANNE WARFIELD


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

BURY HER WITH HER SHINING HAIR, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Bury her with her shining hair
Last Line: Of her who sleeps in death.
Alternate Author Name(s): Warfield, Catherine M.
Subject(s): Funerals; Burials


BURY her with her shining hair
Around her streaming bright;
Bury her with those locks so rare
Enrobing her in light.
As saints, who in their native sky
Their golden haloes wear,
Around her forehead, pure and high,
Enwreathe her shining hair.

She was too frail on earth to stay,
I never saw a face
On which, of premature decay
Was set so plain a trace.
She was too pure to linger here,
Amid the homes of earth;
Her spirit in another sphere
Had its immortal birth.

She was not one to live and love
Amid earth's fading things;
Her being had its home above,
And spread immortal wings.
And around her now, as still she sleeps
Encoffin'd in her prime,
No eye in anguish'd sorrow weeps,
For grief is here sublime.

Even while she lived, an awe was cast
Around her loveliness;
It seem'd as if, whene'er she pass'd,
A spirit came to bless.
A child upraised its tiny hands,
And cried -- "Oh, weep no more,
Mother! behold an angel stands
Before our cottage door."

We would not bring her back to life,
With word, or charm, or sign --
Nor yet recall to scenes of strife
A creature all divine.
We would not even ask to shred
One tress of golden gleam,
That o'er that fair and perfect head
Sheds a refulgent beam.

No! -- lay her with her shining hair
Around her flowing bright;
We would not keep, of one so rare,
Memorials in our sight.
Too harsh a shade would seem to lie
On all things here beneath,
If we beheld one token by,
Of her who sleeps in death.





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