Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume III. Sorrow and Consolation. 1904. | | | | V. Death and Bereavement | | Sleepy Hollow | | William Ellery Channing (1818–1901) |
| | | NO abbey’s gloom, nor dark cathedral stoops, | |
| No winding torches paint the midnight air; | |
| Here the green pines delight, the aspen droops | |
| Along the modest pathways, and those fair | |
| Pale asters of the season spread their plumes | 5 |
| Around this field, fit garden for our tombs. | |
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| And shalt thou pause to hear some funeral bell | |
| Slow stealing o’er thy heart in this calm place, | |
| Not with a throb of pain, a feverish knell, | |
| But in its kind and supplicating grace, | 10 |
| It says, Go, pilgrim, on thy march, be more | |
| Friend to the friendless than thou wast before; | |
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| Learn from the loved one’s rest serenity: | |
| To-morrow that soft bell for thee shall sound, | |
| And thou repose beneath the whispering tree, | 15 |
| One tribute more to this submissive ground;— | |
| Prison thy soul from malice, bar out pride, | |
| Nor these pale flowers nor this still field deride: | |
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| Rather to those ascents of being turn, | |
| Where a ne’er-setting sun illumes the year | 20 |
| Eternal, and the incessant watch-fires burn | |
| Of unspent holiness and goodness clear,— | |
| Forget man’s littleness, deserve the best, | |
| God’s mercy in thy thought and life confest. | | | | |
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