METHINKS it were no pain to die | |
| On such an eve, when such a sky | |
| O’er-canopies the west; | |
| To gaze my fill on yon calm deep, | |
| And, like an infant, fall asleep | 5 |
| On Earth, my mother’s breast. | |
| |
| There ’s peace and welcome in yon sea | |
| Of endless blue tranquillity: | |
| These clouds are living things; | |
| I trace their veins of liquid gold, | 10 |
| I see them solemnly unfold | |
| Their soft and fleecy wings. | |
| |
| These be the angels that convey | |
| Us weary children of a day— | |
| Life’s tedious nothing o’er— | 15 |
| Where neither passions come, nor woes, | |
| To vex the genius of repose | |
| On Death’s majestic shore. | |
| |
| No darkness there divides the sway | |
| With startling dawn and dazzling day; | 20 |
| But gloriously serene | |
| Are the interminable plains: | |
| One fixed, eternal sunset reigns | |
| O’er the wide silent scene. | |
| |
| I cannot doff all human fear; | 25 |
| I know thy greeting is severe | |
| To this poor shell of clay: | |
| Yet come, O Death! thy freezing kiss | |
| Emancipates! thy rest is bliss! | |
| I would I were away! | 30 |
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