Weltschmertz
You ask why I am sad to-day,
I have no cares, no griefs, you say?
Ah, yes, 't is true, I have no grief--
But--is there not the falling leaf?
The bare tree there is mourning left
With all of autumn's gray bereft;
It is not what has happened me,
Think of the bare, dismantled tree.
The birds go South along the sky,
I hear their lingering, long good-bye.
Who goes reluctant from my breast?
And yet--the lone and wind-swept nest.
The mourning, pale-flowered hearse goes by,
Why does a tear come to my eye?
Is it the March rain blowing wild?
I have no dead, I know no child.
I am no widow by the bier
Of him I held supremely dear.
I have not seen the choicest one
Sink down as sinks the westering sun.
Faith unto faith have I beheld,
For me, few solemn notes have swelled;
Love bekoned me out to the dawn,
And happily I followed on.
And yet my heart goes out to them
Whose sorrow is their diadem;
The falling leaf, the crying bird,
The voice to be, all lost, unheard--
Not mine, not mine, and yet too much
The thrilling power of human touch,
While all the world looks on and scorns
I wear another's crown of thorns.
Count me a priest who understands
The glorious pain of nail-pierced hands;
Count me a comrade of the thief
Hot driven into late belief.
Oh, mother's tear, oh, father's sigh,
Oh, mourning sweetheart's last good-bye,
I yet have known no mourning save
Beside some brother's brother's grave.
poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar
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Related quotes
The Burial of Sir John Mackenzie
(1901)
They played him home to the House of Stones
All the way, all the way,
To his grave in the sound of the winter sea:
The sky was dour, the sky was gray.
They played him home with the chieftain's dirge,
Till the wail was wed to the rolling surge,
They played him home with a sorrowful will
To his grave at the foot of the Holy Hill
And the pipes went mourning all the way.
Strong hands that had struck for right
All the day, all the day,
Folded now in the dark of earth,
Veiled dawn of the upper way!
Strong hands that struck with his
From days that were to the day that is
Carry him now from the house of woe
To ride the way the Chief must go:
And his peers went mourning all the way.
Son and brother at his right hand
All the way, all the way!
And O for them and O for her
Who stayed within, the dowie day!
Son and brother and near of kin
Go out with the chief who never comes in!
And of all who loved him far and near
'Twas the nearest most who held him dear --
And his kin went mourning all the way!
The clan went on with the pipes before
All the way, all the way;
A wider clan than ever he knew
Followed him home that dowie day.
And who were they of the wider clan?
The landless man and the no man's man,
The man that lacked and the man unlearned,
The man that lived but as he earned --
And the clan went mourning all the way.
The heart of New Zealand went beside
All the way, all the way,
To the resting-place of her Highland Chief;
Much she thought she could not say;
He found her a land of many domains,
Maiden forest and fallow plains --
He left her a land of many homes,
The pearl of the world where the sea wind roams,
And New Zealand went mourning all the way.
poem by Jessie Mackay
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Mourning Son
Dawn arrives on Golgotha
Shedding light
On the place of the Skull
The Dawn...
Bringing with it
The Mourning Son
The Mourning Son came
Carrying His
Forced Death
on his back
Shunned by those who had loved him
Mock by those he'd shown his love
The Mourning Son rose over the hill
Held only by three nails
Then
Uttered but four more words
Eli! Eli! Lama sabachtani?
Then
The tears
Burning
Stinging
Weeping for those he had lost
poem by Erick Carrasco
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On Another's Sorrow
Can I see another’s woe,
And not be in sorrow too?
Can I see another’s grief,
And not seek for kind relief?
Can I see a falling tear,
And not feel my sorrow’s share?
Can a father see his child
Weep, nor be with sorrow fill'd?
Can a mother sit and hear
An infant groan, an infant fear?
No, no! never can it be!
Never, never can it be!
And can He who smiles on all
Hear the wren with sorrows small,
Hear the small bird’s grief and care,
Hear the woes that infants bear,
And not sit beside the nest,
Pouring pity in their breast;
And not sit the cradle near,
Weeping tear on infant’s tear;
And not sit both night and day,
Wiping all our tears away?
O, no! never can it be!
Never, never can it be!
He doth give His joy to all;
He becomes an infant small;
He becomes a man of woe;
He doth feel the sorrow too.
Think not thou canst sigh a sigh,
And thy Maker is not by:
Think not thou canst weep a tear,
And thy Maker is not near.
O! He gives to us His joy
That our grief he may destroy;
Till our grief is fled & gone
He doth sit by us and moan.
poem by William Blake from Songs of Innocence (1789)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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A Dead Leaf
between these two shores
i float like a dead leaf
am not dead either..
if i was i will not feel the pain
budded flowered and became a fruit
on one shore
eaten and as a bare stray seed laid
at the other shore
as a seed i did germinate
the mother root grew into a tree
an off spring flower and fruit came by
all along as a seed i thought i was the tree itself
I NEVER THOUGHT I WILL LOOSE
MY IDENTITY AS A SEED
CAN A TREE SHOW ITS SEED
EVEN IF IT WANTS TO
ALL ALONG...
I thought i was the tree itself
may be i was a part of each part
the stem to hold, the leaf to nourish
till fate wind blew me down as a dead leaf
today as a dead leaf i float
wanting a living from one shore
wanting relationship from the other
as a dead leaf i float..am not dead with pain
ALL ALONG....
I DID THINK I WAS THE TREE ITSELF
BEING JUST A SEED
poem by Samanyan Lakshminarayanan
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Love Me Like I Love Everything I Do
Love me like I love bathing under the glorious sun
Love me like I love dreaming inside of heaven’s arm
Love me like I love crying in the mourning rain
Love me like I love sitting on top of a mountain
Love me like I love waiting next to forever in vain
Love me like I love grinning to the devil’s pain
Love me like I love watching the stars falling upon
Love me like I love spending time on my own
Love me like I love finding something true
Love me like I love falling in love with you
poem by Bikramjyoti Kashyop
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Love Me Like I Love Everything I Do
Love me like I love bathing under the glorious sun
Love me like I love dreaming inside of heaven’s arm
Love me like I love crying in the mourning rain
Love me like I love sitting on top of a mountain
Love me like I love waiting next to forever in vain
Love me like I love grinning to the devil’s pain
Love me like I love watching the stars falling upon
Love me like I love spending time on my own
Love me like I love finding something true
Love me like I love falling in love with you
poem by Alexander Foald
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Autumn: A Dirge
The warm sun is falling, the bleak wind is wailing,
The bare boughs are sighing, the pale flowers are dying,
And the Year
On the earth is her death-bed, in a shroud of leaves dead,
Is lying.
Come, Months, come away,
From November to May,
In your saddest array;
Follow the bier
Of the dead cold Year,
And like dim shadows watch by her sepulchre.
The chill rain is falling, the nipped worm is crawling,
The rivers are swelling, the thunder is knelling
For the Year;
The blithe swallows are flown, and the lizards each gone
To his dwelling.
Come, Months, come away;
Put on white, black and gray;
Let your light sisters play--
Ye, follow the bier
Of the dead cold Year,
And make her grave green with tear on tear.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Affirm The Fragile!
i cannot fix
the broken branch,
so i use it to build the fire.
and in the quiet of evening,
i sit in mourning with the tree!
i cannot bring back
the wind after it's gone,
so i look for the traces left behind.
the curtain swept, the lamp put out...
and sing praises with silent awe!
i cannot make the human being
to be more human,
so i love both the weaknesses
and the strengths...
and in doing so affirm the fragile,
with the faith that moves mountains!
poem by Eric Cockrell
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Burial of the Dead
I thought to meet no more, so dreary seem'd
Death's interposing veil, and thou so pure,
Thy place in Paradise
Beyond where I could soar;
Friend of this worthless heart! but happier thoughts
Spring like unbidden violets from the sod,
Where patiently thou tak'st
Thy sweet and sure repose.
The shadows fall more soothing: the soft air
Is full of cheering whispers like thine own;
While Memory, by thy grave,
Lives o'er thy funeral day;
The deep knell dying down, the mourners' pause,
Waiting their Saviour's welcome at the gate.—
Sure with the words of Heaven
Thy spirit met us there,
And sought with us along th' accustom'd way
The hallow'd porch, and entering in, beheld
The pageant of sad joy
So dear to Faith and Hope.
O! hadst thou brought a strain from Paradise
To cheer us, happy soul, thou hadst not touch'd
The sacred springs of grief
More tenderly and true,
Than those deep-warbled anthems, high and low,
Low as the grave, high as th' Eternal Throne,
Guiding through light and gloom
Our mourning fancies wild,
Till gently, like soft golden clouds at eve
Around the western twilight, all subside
Into a placid faith,
That even with beaming eye
Counts thy sad honours, coffin, bier, and pall;
So many relics of a frail love lost,
So many tokens dear
Of endless love begun.
Listen! it is no dream: th' Apostles' trump
Gives earnest of th' Archangel's;—calmly now,
Our hearts yet beating high
To that victorious lay
(Most like a warrior's, to the martial dirge
Of a true comrade), in the grave we trust
Our treasure for awhile:
And if a tear steal down,
If human anguish o'er the shaded brow
Pass shuddering, when the handful of pure earth
Touches the coffin-lid;
If at our brother's name,
Once and again the thought, 'for ever gone,'
Come o'er us like a cloud; yet, gentle spright,
Thou turnest not away,
Thou know'st us calm at heart.
One look, and we have seen our last of thee,
Till we too sleep and our long sleep be o'er.
O cleanse us, ere we view
That countenance pure again,
Thou, who canst change the heart, and raise the dead!
As Thou art by to soothe our parting hour,
Be ready when we meet,
With Thy dear pardoning words.
poem by John Keble
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GoOd MoUrNiNg SuNsHiNe
GoOd MoUrNiNg SuNsHiNe
ItS TiMe FoR YoU To AwAkE AnD SeE ThE DaY
No NeEd To HiDe BiHiNd ThE CLoUdS
YoUr LiGhT I NeEd To ShInE AnD GuIdE My WaY
GoOd MoUrNiNg SuNsHiNe
I NeEd YoU To ShInE BrIgHt
StAy HiGh DoNt BeGiN To LoOsE YoUr LiGhT
EvEn ThOuGh YoU MaY SeE DaRkNeSs
ALwAyS STAy, DoNt LeT Go, NoT WiThOuT A FiGhT
GoOd MoUrNiNg SuNsHiNe
NoThInG In ThIs WoRLd CaN EvEr TaKe YoUr PLaCe
WhEnEvEr I NeEdEd YoUr WaRmTh I WoUlD JuSt LoOk Up
AnD ThErE YoU WeRe, NeVeR FaILiNg To ShOw YoUr FaCe
GoOd MoUrNiNg SuNsHiNe
I WiLL ALwAyS NeEd YoU CaNt YoU SeE
No PlAcE ELsE Do YoU BeLoNg
BeCaUsE YoU BeLoNg In ThIs WoRLd WiTh Me
poem by Frandy Osias Louis
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Three Island Songs
AFTER the wind in the wood,
Peace, and the night.
After the bond and the brood,
Flight.
After the height and the hush
Where the wild hawk swings,
Heart of the earth-loving thrush
Shaken with wings.
After the bloom and the leaf
Rain on the nest.
After the splendour and grief,
Rest.
After the hills and the far
Glories and gleams,
Cloud, and the dawn of a star,
And dreams.
------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------
O, THE gray rocks of the islands and the hemlock green above them,
The foam beneath the wild rose bloom, the star above the shoal.
When I am old and weary I'll wake my heart to love them,
For the blue ways of the islands are wound about my soul.
[Page 66]
Here in the early even when the young gray dew is falling,
And the king-heron seeks his mate beyond the loneliest wild,
Still your heart in the twilight, and you'll hear the river calling
Through all her outmost islands to seek her lastborn child.
------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------
I SAT among the green leaves, and heard the nuts falling,
The broad red butterflies were gold against the sun,
But in between the silence and the sweet birds calling
The nuts fell one by one.
Why should they fall and the year but half over ?
Why should sorrow seek me and I so young and kind ?
The leaf is on the bough and the dew is on the clover,
But the green nuts are falling in the wind.
O, I gave my lips away and all my soul behind them.
Why should trouble follow and the quick tears start ?
The little birds may love and fly with only God to mind them,
But the green nuts are falling on my heart.
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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Archy's Song from Charles the First (A Widow Bird Sate Mourning For Her Love)
Heigho! the lark and the owl!
One flies the morning, and one lulls the night:
Only the nightingale, poor fond soul,
Sings like the fool through darkness and light.
'A widow bird sate mourning for her love
Upon a wintry bough;
The frozen wind crept on above,
The freezing stream below.
'There was no leaf upon the forest bare,
No flower upon the ground,
And little motion in the air
Except the mill-wheel's sound.'
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Lonely Leaf
Lonely leaf
trembles
at the feeble moment
It's on the verge of falling
It's about to merge with limitless nature!
Air is guest to leaf once
now will become constant companion
Bond with tree
soon will be abandoned
The moment came
parting is always pain
fighting against time is invain
finally tree says farewell to the leaf
Now leaf realises boundless 'freedom'
It's floating like free bird
It is 'gone with the wind'
Leaf lost it's green colour
wearing pale colour
Colour hardly matters!
Leaf sings song of freedom
Bond with tree is bound
Feeling freedom is ecstasy abound
poem by Mula Veereswara Rao
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Untitled (Broken Hearted)
You left this world without a warning,
And all of the sudden I was in mourning.
I thought we would never be apart,
And now I'm left with a broken heart.
Tear flow down like rain,
And all I feel now is pain
poem by Brenda Main
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The leaf in the wind
The leaf in the wind
Missed the tree
The tree it was in
That made it be
It fell to the porch
A child held it
And gave it a stroke
Then gently left it
The wind came again
And took it to the sky
Then the sky rained
And it fell to lie
The things on the ground
Kept pushing it away
The wind had an angry sound
It wanted it in its way
So the wind blew
And picked up the leaf
And held it through
Earth’s grief and relief
No tree would claim
The young leaf left
Touched by time
Time itself had left
poem by Ragy Sandid
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Friday Mourning
Friday mourning
I'm dressed in black
Douse the houselights
I'm not coming back
For years I warned you
Through tears I told you
Friday mourning
There comes a time
A flaw that breaks
This very smug mug of mine
This dawn raid
Soon put paid to all the things
I whispered to you at night time
And I will never stand naked
In front of you, or if I do
It won't be for a long time
Look once to me, Look once to me - then look away
Look once to me, Look once to me - then look away
And when they haul me down the hall
And when they kick me down the stairs
I see the faces all lined up before me
Of teachers and of parents
And bosses, who
All share a point of view
"You are a loser"
"You are a loser"
Friday / Friday mourning
Dressed in black
I won't be coming back
Friday / Friday mourning
Dressed in black
I won't be coming back
song performed by by Morrissey
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Distant Rainfall
Like mourning women veiled to the feet
Tall slender rainstorms walk slowly against gray cloud along the
far verge.
The ocean is green where the river empties,
Dull gray between the points of the headlands, purple where
the women walk.
What do they want? Whom are they mourning?
What hero's dust in the urn between the two hands hidden in
the veil?
Titaness after Titaness proudly
Bearing her tender magnificent sorrow at her heart, the lost
battle's beauty.
poem by Robinson Jeffers
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A Prayer For The King's Majesty
22nd January, 1901.
THE Queen is dead. God save the King,
In this his hour of grief,
When sorrow gathers memories in a sheaf
To lay them on his shoulders as he stands
Inheriting her glories and her lands--
First gain of his at which his Mother's voice
Has not been first to bless and to rejoice--
A man, set lonely between gain and loss.
(O words of love the heart remembereth,
O mighty loss outweighing every gain!)
A Son whose kingdom Death's arm lies across,
A King whose Mother lies alone with Death
Wrapped in the folds of white implacable sleep.
O God, who seest the tears Thy children weep,
O God, who countest each sad heart-beat, see
How our King needs the grace we ask of Thee!
Thou knowest how little and how vain a thing
Is Empire, when the heart is sick with pain--
God, save the King!
The Queen is dead. The splendour of her days,
The sorrow of them both alike merge now
In the new aureole that lights her brow.
The clamour of her people's voice in praise
Must hush itself to the still voice that prays
In the holy chamber of Death. Tread softly here,
A mighty Queen lies dead.
Her people's heart wears black,
The black bells toll unceasing in their ear,
And on the gold sun's track
The great world round
Like a black ring the voice of mourning goes,
Till even our ancient foes
With eyes downbent, and brotherly bared head,
Keep mourning watch with us. This is the hour
When Love lends all his power
To speed grief's arrows from the bow of Death,
When sighs are idle breath,
When tears are fountains vain.
She will not wake again,
Not now, not here.
O great and good and infinitely dear,
O Mother of your people, sleep is sweet,
No more Life's thorny ways will wound your feet.
O Mother dear, sleep sound!
When you shall wake,
Your brows freed from the crown that made them ache
So many a time, and wear the heavenly crown,
Then, then you will look down
On us who love you, and, remembering,
The love of earth will breathe with us our prayer,
Our prayer prayed here, joined to your prayer prayed there:
Who knows what radiant answer it may bring?
'God save the King!'
The Queen is dead. God save the King!
From all ill thought and deed,
From heartless service and from selfish sway,
From treason, and the vain imagining
Of evil counsellors, and the noisome breed
Of flatterers who eat the soul away,
God save the King!
From loss and pain and tears
Such as her many years
Brought her; from battle and strife,
And the inmost hurt of life,
The wounds that no crown can heal,
No ermine robes conceal,
God save the King!
God, by our memories of his Mother's face,
By the love that makes our heart her dwelling-place,
Grant to our sorrow this desired grace:
God save the King!
* * * * * * * * *
The Queen is dead. God save the King.
This is no hour when joy has leave to sing;
Only, amid our tears, we are bold to pray,
More boldly, in that we pray sorrowing,
In this most sorrowful day.
God, who wast of a mortal Mother born,
Who driest the tears with which Thy children mourn,
God, save the King!
Look down on him whose crown is wet with tears
In which its splendour fades and disappears--
His tears, our tears, tears out of all her lands.
The Queen is dead.
God! strengthen the King's hands!
God, save the King!
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Good Night My Brother
Good Night My Brother
Good Night my dear brother.
It seems that is all I can say
as today you close your eyes on this, now fated day.
My mother she shed a tear and asked us all simply to pray.
We hear her heart breaking
Cracking as she… shuffles.
She moves quietly in her room.
The house is still lit, she doesn’t want any gloom.
She ponders to herself we are sure; of what is to come.
The children left behind, still wondering on the moment.
One minute he was there and the next he is gone.
Confused by it all...the children...Oh the children! ...oh what is to done?
The police have now come and gone
as dear brother he passed away at home
lying on his bed, no movement.. no…no breathing in his room.
Good night my dear brother
Those cigarettes
They did you in.
We spoke but some weeks ago
you lamented then, that that may be the way you will go!
Those accursed things took my father too...you knew this then and here we are
Five years later and back again.
Good night my dear brother
It seems that is all I can say
I love you dearly
You knew that...I love you beyond the grave.
I know God now keeps you
I know that you accepted him
I believe God keeps you,
So good night my brother dear, our journey has not come to an end.
Your sister. For my brother Val.
Elaine Oxamendi Vicet
11: 03pm
poem by Elaine Oxamendi Vicet
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The Forsaken
A gathering burst of a darkened sky
A standing tree in a deserted aisle
A silent stream in a screaming soul
A lonesome man on the lonely tree
The sun resigns and the moon declines
A star wipes away a tear as another falls
A grieving father with a mouth wide shut
A shouting out of a broken heart
A bended will to a noble plan
An undeserving man with the killing nail
A piercing through his mortal sides
The world's weight on a shoulder sagged
The guiltiest frame of a triple stand
Innocent indeed of all charges laid
Guilty indeed of the sins of the whole
wide world
I did them not but for you I did
My heart is broken, your sins are mine
What have you done? , I take the blame
Oh, this is hard, where's God, my dad
My friends they've left, no one's around
I'm a quiet man but on this heavy night
I'd disturb the peace for pain's own sake
'My father, my father why have you
forsaken me! ! ! '
The one who spoke the world into being
Is silent now, what is going on?
Dad, it's me, your only son
Undo me now, this is too much
The skies they weep, the angels too
My spirit gives in to a higher will
A silent night. A night for you.
To the thief, the whore, outcasts alike
To the mourning, the lonely, and failing
ones
To the orphan and the poor alike
To all that have fallen short of glory's
sun
And all that darkness has keenly torn
On those nights you cry alone
And those days you have no friend
I went through this to know your pain
To heal your pain and be your friend
I see you through the eyes of love
The Love that would give up his only son
Before he'd ever give up on you
I will never leave you, nor ever can
forsake you
I Love You.
poem by Jenim Dibie
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