| |
| FOLD thy hands, thy work is over; | |
| Cool thy watching eyes with tears; | |
| Let thy poor heart, over-wearied, | |
| Rest alike from hopes and fears,— | |
| |
| Hopes, that saw with sleepless vision | 5 |
| One sad picture fading slow; | |
| Fears, that followed, vague and nameless, | |
| Lifting back the veils of snow. | |
| |
| For thy brave one, for thy lost one, | |
| Truest heart of woman, weep! | 10 |
| Owning still the love that granted | |
| Unto thy beloved sleep. | |
| |
| Not for him that hour of terror | |
| When, the long ice-battle o’er, | |
| In the sunless day his comrades | 15 |
| Deathward trod the Polar shore. | |
| |
| Spared the cruel cold and famine, | |
| Spared the fainting heart’s despair, | |
| What but that could mercy grant him? | |
| What but that has been thy prayer? | 20 |
| |
| Dear to thee that last memorial | |
| From the cairn beside the sea; | |
| Evermore the month of roses | |
| Shall be sacred time to thee. | |
| |
| Sad it is the mournful yew-tree | 25 |
| O’er his slumbers may not wave; | |
| Sad it is the English daisy | |
| May not blossom on his grave. | |
| |
| But his tomb shall storm and winter | |
| Shape and fashion year by year, | 30 |
| Pile his mighty mausoleum, | |
| Block by block, and tier on tier. | |
| |
| Guardian of its gleaming portal | |
| Shall his stainless honor be, | |
| While thy love, a sweet immortal, | 35 |
| Hovers o’er the winter sea. | |
| |
