Classic and Contemporary Poetry
LINES, by CATHERINE ANNE WARFIELD Poet's Biography First Line: Lay them, lay them in their graves Last Line: Was waxing faint and cold. Alternate Author Name(s): Warfield, Catherine M. | ||||||||
"You must make That heart a tomb, and in it bury deep Its young and beautiful feelings." BARRY CORNWALL LAY them, lay them in their graves, Those feelings, deep and fine; Henceforth their marble tomb shall be The heart that was their shrine. Bury them with all the dreams Of those departed years, When joy was all too bright for smiles! And grief too deep for tears! Close within that stony vault, Which never more shall ope, The bitterness of memory, The feverishness of hope, The yearnings deep for sympathy, That deep within thee dwell, The love that finds no answering flame, And sickens in its cell. Spread, O spread above that tomb A pall of purple pride, To veil the darkness and the gloom That 'neath its folds abide. Bear thee gaily in the dance, And proudly in the hall; I charge thee, let no eye behold What moulders 'neath that pall. It is thus that I have done, For such hath been my doom; My heart was once a fiery shrine, And now it is -- a tomb! My heart was once a storm-swept sea, And now it is that lake, O'er whose dead surface tempests rush, Nor bid its waters wake. Yet the ghosts of those dead thoughts, Those buried hopes and fears, They rise at times across the soul, Recalling vanish'd years: They float in dim and pale array, Those phantoms of the past; They freeze my blood -- they chill my brain, As with an Iceland blast. Oh! the spectres of the soul, How fearfully they rise; Each looking from its fleecy shroud With cold, clear spirit eyes. How chill a print their icy feet Leave on the burning brain; How bleak a shadow do they cast. That dim and awful train. Back to your cells, ye fleeting things, I do command ye, back! Obey the sceptre of despair, Retrace your ghostly track. Back to your tomb where ye were pent, Like the frail nuns of old, Ere yet the grief that was your life Was waxing faint and cold. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MANASSAS [JULY 21, 1861] by CATHERINE ANNE WARFIELD A VALLEY OF VIRGINIA by CATHERINE ANNE WARFIELD BURY HER WITH HER SHINING HAIR by CATHERINE ANNE WARFIELD THE PALACES OF ARABY! by CATHERINE ANNE WARFIELD GIRL IN A CAGE by CARL SANDBURG THE ITINERANT POET'S ROAD SONG by KAREN SWENSON TO LIZBIE BROWNE by THOMAS HARDY |
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