Related quotes: I. That time is dead...

Lines: That time is dead for ever, child!

I.
That time is dead for ever, child!
Drowned, frozen, dead for ever!
We look on the past
And stare aghast
At the spectres wailing, pale and ghast,
Of hopes which thou and I beguiled
To death on life’s dark river.

II.
The stream we gazed on then rolled by;
Its waves are unreturning;
But we yet stand
In a lone land,
Like tombs to mark the memory
Of hopes and fears, which fade and flee
In the light of life’s dim morning.

poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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To His Mistress

Why dost thou shade thy lovely face? O why
Does that eclipsing hand of thine deny
The sunshine of the Sun's enlivening eye?

Without thy light what light remains in me?
Thou art my life; my way, my light's in thee;
I live, I move, and by thy beams I see.

Thou art my life-if thou but turn away
My life's a thousand deaths. Thou art my way-
Without.thee, Love, I travel not but stray.

My light thou art-without thy glorious sight
My eyes are darken'd with eternal night.
My Love, thou art my way, my life, my light.

Thou art my way; I wander if thou fly.
Thou art my light; if hid, how blind am I!
Thou art my life; if thou withdraw'st, I die.

My eyes are dark and blind, I cannot see:
To whom or whither should my darkness flee,
But to that light?-and who's that light but thee?

If I have lost my path, dear lover, say,
Shall I still wander in a doubtful way?
Love, shall a lamb of Israel's sheepfold stray?

My path is lost, my wandering steps do stray;
I cannot go, nor can I safely stay;
Whom should I seek but thee, my path, my way?

And yet thou turn'st thy face away and fly'st me!
And yet I sue for grace and thou deny'st me!
Speak, art thou angry, Love, or only try'st me?

Thou art the pilgrim's path, the blind man's eye,
The dead man's life. On thee my hopes rely:
If I but them remove, I surely die.

Dissolve thy sunbeams, close thy wings and stay!
See, see how I am blind, and dead, and stray!
-O thou art my life, my light, my way!

Then work thy will! If passion bid me flee,
My reason shall obey, my wings shall be
Stretch'd out no farther than from me to thee!

poem by Lord John Wilmot
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Why dost thou Shade thy Lovely Face?

1 Why dost thou shade thy lovely face? Oh, why
2 Does that eclipsing hand so long deny
3 The sunshine of thy soul-enliv'ning eye?

4 Without that light, what light remains in me?
5 Thou art my life, my way, my light; in thee
6 I live, I move, and by thy beams I see.

7 Thou art mv life; if thou but turn away
8 My life's a thousand deaths: thou art my way;
9 Without thee, Lord, I travel not, but stray.

10 My light thou art; without thy glorious sight
11 Mine eyes are darken'd with perpetual night.
12 My God, thou art my way, my life, my light.

13 Thou art my way; I wander if thou fly:
14 Thou art my light; if hid, how blind am I!
15 Thou art my life; if thou withdraw, I die.

16 Mine eyes are blind and dark, I cannot see;
17 To whom or whither should my darkness flee,
18 But to the light? and who's that light but thee?

19 My path is lost, my wand'ring steps do stray;
20 I cannot safely go, nor safely stay;
21 Whom should I seek but thee, my path, my way?

22 Oh, I am dead: to whom shall I, poor I,
23 Repair? to whom shall my sad ashes fly,
24 But life? and where is life but in thine eye?

25 And yet thou turn'st away thy face, and fly'st me;
26 And yet I sue for grace, and thou deny'st me;
27 Speak, art thou angry, Lord, or only try'st me?

28 Unscreen those heavenly lamps, or tell me why
29 Thou shad'st thy face; perhaps thou think'st no eye
30 Can view those flames, and not drop down and die.

31 If that be all, shine forth, and draw thee nigher;
32 Let me behold and die, for my desire
33 Is ph{oe}nix-like to perish in that fire.

34 Death-conquer'd Laz'rus was redeem'd by thee;
35 If I am dead, Lord, set death's prisoner free;
36 Am I more spent, or stink I worse than he?

37 If my puff'd life be out, give leave to tine
38 My shameless snuff at that bright lamp of thine;
39 Oh, what's thy light the less for lighting mine?

40 If I have lost my path, great Shepherd, say,
41 Shall I still wander in a doubtful way?
42 Lord, shall a lamb of Israel's sheep-fold stray?

43 Thou art the pilgrim's path, the blind man's eye,
44 The dead man's life; on thee my hopes rely;
45 If thou remove, I err, I grope, I die.

46 Disclose thy sunbeams; close thy wings, and stay;
47 See, see how I am blind, and dead, and stray,
48 O thou, that art my light, my life, my way.

poem by Francis Quarles
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Then and Now -A Stone Breaker

When first I saw thee breaking stones
My heart was filled with praise
And delight on a rose like face.
What heaving bosom and how did it nurse
The hopes of life and desires of youth
And how joyfully didst thou talk
Of life everlasting.
But now I am pained to see thee;
Is it thou same young lady?
So changed in so short a time!
These sunken eyes, these hollow looks
Are these the same that pierced my heart?
O stony stare, where is life?
Whither is hope fled?
These withered cheeks, these pale lips
No more betray the colour of a rose;
And this bosom which once did nurse
The hopes of life; the joys of youth:
To this bosom now clings a child,
A life! Oh no no no
It's misery nursing death.

poem by Om Chawla
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A Dialogue

I
DEATH, if thou wilt, fain would I plead with thee:
Canst thou not spare, of all our hopes have built,
One shelter where our spirits fain would be,
Death, if thou wit?

No dome with suns and dews impearled and gilt,
Imperial: but some roof of wildwood tree,
Too mean for sceptre's heft or swordblade's hilt.

Some low sweet roof where love might live, set free
From change and fear and dreams of grief or guilt;
Canst thou not leave life even thus much to see,
Death, if thou wilt?

II
Man, what art thou to speak and plead with me?
What knowest thou of my workings, where and how
What things I fashion? Nay, behold and see,
Man, what art thou?

Thy fruits of life, and blossoms of thy bough,
What are they but my seedlings? Earth and sea
Bear nought but when I breathe on it must bow.

Bow thou too down before me: though thou be
Great, all the pride shall fade from off thy brow,
When Time and strong Oblivion ask of thee,
Man, what art thou ?

III
Death, if thou be or be not, as was said,
Immortal; if thou make us nought, or we
Survive: thy power is made but of our dread,
Death, if thou be.

Thy might is made out of our fear of thee:
Who fears thee not, hath plucked from off thine head
The crown of cloud that darkens earth and sea.

Earth, sea, and sky, as rain or vapour shed,
Shall vanish; all the shows of them shall flee:
Then shall we know full surely, quick or dead,
Death, if thou be.

poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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Invitation To Eternity

Say, wilt thou go with me, sweet maid,
Say, maiden, wilt thou go with me
Through the valley-depths of shade,
Of bright and dark obscurity;
Where the path has lost its way,
Where the sun forgets the day,
Where there's nor light nor life to see,
Sweet maiden, wilt thou go with me?

Where stones will turn to flooding streams,
Where plains will rise like ocean's waves,
Where life will fade like visioned dreams
And darkness darken into caves,
Say, maiden, wilt thou go with me
Through this sad non-identity
Where parents live and are forgot,
And sisters live and know us not?

Say, maiden, wilt thou go with me
In this strange death of life to be,
To live in death and be the same,
Without this life or home or name,
At once to be and not to be--
That was and is not--yet to see
Things pass like shadows, and the sky
Above, below, around us lie?

The land of shadows wilt thou trace,
Nor look nor know each other's face;
The present marred with reason gone,
And past and present both as one?
Say, maiden, can thy life be led
To join the living and the dead?
Then trace thy footsteps on with me:
We are wed to one eternity.

poem by John Clare
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A Dialog

Death, if thou wilt, fain would I plead with thee:
Canst thou not spare, of all our hopes have built,
One shelter where our spirits fain would be,
Death, if thou wilt?

No dome with suns and dews impearled and gilt,
Imperial: but some roof of wildwood tree,
Too mean for sceptre's heft or swordblade's hilt.

Some low sweet roof where love might live, set free
From change and fear and dreams of grief or guilt;
Canst thou not leave life even thus much to see,
Death, if thou wilt?

II.

Man, what art thou to speak and plead with me?
What knowest thou of my workings, where and how
What things I fashion? Nay, behold and see,
Man, what art thou?

Thy fruits of life, and blossoms of thy bough,
What are they but my seedlings? Earth and sea
Bear nought but when I breathe on it must bow.

Bow thou too down before me: though thou be
Great, all the pride shall fade from off thy brow,
When Time and strong Oblivion ask of thee,
Man, what art thou?

III.

Death, if thou be or be not, as was said,
Immortal; if thou make us nought, or we
Survive: thy power is made but of our dread,
Death, if thou be.

Thy might is made out of our fear of thee:
Who fears thee not, hath plucked from off thine head
The crown of cloud that darkens earth and sea.

Earth, sea, and sky, as rain or vapour shed,
Shall vanish; all the shows of them shall flee:
Then shall we know full surely, quick or dead,
Death, if thou be.

poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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Death Is Here And Death Is There

I.
Death is here and death is there,
Death is busy everywhere,
All around, within, beneath,
Above is death—and we are death.

II.
Death has set his mark and seal
On all we are and all we feel,
On all we know and all we fear,

...

III.
First our pleasures die—and then
Our hopes, and then our fears—and when
These are dead, the debt is due,
Dust claims dust—and we die too.

IV.
All things that we love and cherish,
Like ourselves must fade and perish;
Such is our rude mortal lot--
Love itself would, did they not.

poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Death. A Dialogue

Soul.

'TIS a sad Land, that in one day
Hath dull'd thee thus ; when death shall freeze
Thy blood to ice, and thou must stay
Tenant for years, and centuries ;
How wilt thou brook't ?

Body.

I cannot tell ;
But if all sense wings not with thee,
And something still be left the dead,
I'll wish my curtains off, to free
Me from so dark and sad a bed :

A nest of nights, a gloomy sphere,
Where shadows thicken, and the cloud
Sits on the sun's brow all the year,
And nothing moves without a shroud.

Soul.

'Tis so : but as thou saw'st that night
We travail'd in, our first attempts
Were dull and blind, but custom straight
Our fears and falls brought to contempt :

Then, when the ghastly twelve was past,
We breath'd still for a blushing East,
And bade the lazy sun make haste,
And on sure hopes, though long, did feast.

But when we saw the clouds to crack,
And in those crannies light appear'd,
We thought the day then was not slack,
And pleas'd ourselves with what we fear'd.

Just so it is in death. But thou
Shalt in thy mother's bosom sleep,
Whilst I each minute groan to know
How near Redemption creeps.

Then shall wee meet to mix again, and met,
'Tis last good-night ; our Sun shall never set.

JOB, CAP. IO. VER. 21, 22.

Before I go whence I shall not return, even to the
land of darkness, and the shadow of death ;
A Land of darkness, as darkness itself, and of the
shadow of death, without any order, and where the
light is as darkness.

poem by Henry Vaughan
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A Dead Friend

Gone, O gentle heart and true,
Friend of hopes foregone,
Hopes and hopeful days with you
Gone?

Days of old that shone
Saw what none shall see anew,
When we gazed thereon.

Soul as clear as sunlit dew,
Why so soon pass on,
Forth from all we loved and knew
Gone?

II.

Friend of many a season fled,
What may sorrow send
Toward thee now from lips that said
'Friend'?

Sighs and songs to blend
Praise with pain uncomforted
Though the praise ascend?

Darkness hides no dearer head:
Why should darkness end
Day so soon, O dear and dead
Friend?

III.

Dear in death, thou hast thy part
Yet in life, to cheer
Hearts that held thy gentle heart
Dear.

Time and chance may sear
Hope with grief, and death may part
Hand from hand's clasp here:

Memory, blind with tears that start,
Sees through every tear
All that made thee, as thou art,
Dear.

IV.

True and tender, single-souled,
What should memory do
Weeping o'er the trust we hold
True?

Known and loved of few,
But of these, though small their fold,
Loved how well were you!

Change, that makes of new things old,
Leaves one old thing new;
Love which promised truth, and told
True.

Kind as heaven, while earth's control
Still had leave to bind
Thee, thy heart was toward man's whole
Kind.

Thee no shadows blind
Now: the change of hours that roll
Leaves thy sleep behind.

Love, that hears thy death-bell toll
Yet, may call to mind
Scarce a soul as thy sweet soul
Kind.

VI.

How should life, O friend, forget
Death, whose guest art thou?
Faith responds to love's regret,
How?

Still, for us that bow
Sorrowing, still, though life be set,
Shines thy bright mild brow.

Yea, though death and thou be met,
Love may find thee now
Still, albeit we know not yet
How.

VII.

Past as music fades, that shone
While its life might last;
As a song-bird's shadow flown
Past!

Death's reverberate blast
Now for music's lord has blown
Whom thy love held fast.

Dead thy king, and void his throne:
Yet for grief at last
Love makes music of his own
Past.

poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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Lines Written On Hearing The News Of The Death Of Napoleon

What! alive and so bold, O Earth?
Art thou not overbold?
What! leapest thou forth as of old
In the light of thy morning mirth,
The last of the flock of the starry fold?
Ha! leapest thou forth as of old?
Are not the limbs still when the ghost is fled,
And canst thou move, Napoleon being dead?

How! is not thy quick heart cold?
What spark is alive on thy hearth?
How! is not HIS death-knell knolled?
And livest THOU still, Mother Earth?
Thou wert warming thy fingers old
O’er the embers covered and cold
Of that most fiery spirit, when it fled--
What, Mother, do you laugh now he is dead?

'Who has known me of old,' replied Earth,
'Or who has my story told?
It is thou who art overbold.'
And the lightning of scorn laughed forth
As she sung, 'To my bosom I fold
All my sons when their knell is knolled,
And so with living motion all are fed,
And the quick spring like weeds out of the dead.

'Still alive and still bold,' shouted Earth,
'I grow bolder and still more bold.
The dead fill me ten thousandfold
Fuller of speed, and splendour, and mirth.
I was cloudy, and sullen, and cold,
Like a frozen chaos uprolled,
Till by the spirit of the mighty dead
My heart grew warm. I feed on whom I fed.

'Ay, alive and still bold.' muttered Earth,
'Napoleon's fierce spirit rolled,
In terror and blood and gold,
A torrent of ruin to death from his birth.
Leave the millions who follow to mould
The metal before it be cold;
And weave into his shame, which like the dead
Shrouds me, the hopes that from his glory fled.'

poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Sonnet XXIII. By The Same. To The North Star.

TO thy bright beams I turn my swimming eyes,
Fair, favourite planet, which in happier days
Saw my young hopes, ah, faithless hopes!--arise,
And on my passion shed propitious rays.
Now nightly wandering 'mid the tempests drear
That howl the woods and rocky steeps among,
I love to see thy sudden light appear
Through the swift clouds--driven by the wind along:
Or in the turbid water, rude and dark,
O'er whose wild stream the gust of Winter raves,
Thy trembling light with pleasure still I mark,
Gleam in faint radiance on the foaming waves!
So o'er my soul short rays of reason fly,
Then fade:--and leave me to despair and die.

poem by Charlotte Smith
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His Books

MY days among the Dead are past;
Around me I behold,
Where'er these casual eyes are cast,
The mighty minds of old:
My never-failing friends are they,
With whom I converse day by day.

With them I take delight in weal
And seek relief in woe;
And while I understand and feel
How much to them I owe,
My cheeks have often been bedew'd
With tears of thoughtful gratitude.

My thoughts are with the Dead; with them
I live in long-past years,
Their virtues love, their faults condemn,
Partake their hopes and fears;
And from their lessons seek and find
Instruction with an humble mind.

My hopes are with the Dead; anon
My place with them will be,
And I with them shall travel on
Through all Futurity;
Yet leaving here a name, I trust,
That will not perish in the dust.

poem by Robert Southey
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My Days among the Dead are Past

My days among the Dead are past;
Around me I behold,
Where'er these casual eyes are cast,
The mighty minds of old;
My never-failing friends are they,
With whom I converse day by day.

With them I take delight in weal,
And seek relief in woe;
And while I understand and feel
How much to them I owe,
My cheeks have often been bedew'd
With tears of thoughtful gratitude.

My thoughts are with the Dead, with them
I live in long-past years,
Their virtues love, their faults condemn,
Partake their hopes and fears,
And from their lessons seek and find
Instruction with an humble mind.

My hopes are with the Dead, anon
My place with them will be,
And I with them shall travel on
Through all Futurity;
Yet leaving here a name, I trust,
That will not perish in the dust.

poem by Robert Southey
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Death Alone

There are lone cemeteries,
tombs full of soundless bones,
the heart threading a tunnel,
a dark, dark tunnel :
like a wreck we die to the very core,
as if drowning at the heart
or collapsing inwards from skin to soul.

There are corpses,
clammy slabs for feet,
there is death in the bones,
like a pure sound,
a bark without its dog,
out of certain bells, certain tombs
swelling in this humidity like lament or rain.

I see, when alone at times,
coffins under sail
setting out with the pale dead, women in their dead braids,
bakers as white as angels,
thoughtful girls married to notaries,
coffins ascending the vertical river of the dead,
the wine-dark river to its source,
with their sails swollen with the sound of death,
filled with the silent noise of death.

Death is drawn to sound
like a slipper without a foot, a suit without its wearer,
comes to knock with a ring, stoneless and fingerless,
comes to shout without a mouth, a tongue, without a throat.
Nevertheless its footsteps sound
and its clothes echo, hushed like a tree.

I do not know, I am ignorant, I hardly see
but it seems to me that its song has the colour of wet violets,
violets well used to the earth,
since the face of death is green,
and the gaze of death green
with the etched moisture of a violet's leaf
and its grave colour of exasperated winter.

But death goes about the earth also, riding a broom
lapping the ground in search of the dead -
death is in the broom,
it is the tongue of death looking for the dead,
the needle of death looking for the thread.

Death lies in our beds :
in the lazy mattresses, the black blankets,
lives a full stretch and then suddenly blows,
blows sound unknown filling out the sheets
and there are beds sailing into a harbour
where death is waiting, dressed as an admiral.

poem by Pablo Neruda
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Cupid's Funeral

BY his side, whose days are past,
Lay bow and quiver!
And his eyes that stare aghast
Close, with a shiver.
God nor man from Death, at last,
Love may deliver.
Though—of old—we vowed, my dear,
Death should not take him;
Mourn not thou that we must here
Coldly forsake him;
Shed above his grave no tear—
Tears will not wake him.

Cupid lieth cold and dead—
Ended his flying,
Pale his lips, once rosy-red,
Swift was his dying.
Place a stone above his head,
Turn away, sighing.

poem by Victor James Daley
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Beleaguered City, The

I have read, in some old, marvellous tale,
Some legend strange and vague,
That a midnight host of spectres pale
Beleaguered the walls of Prague.

Beside the Moldau's rushing stream,
With the wan moon overhead,
There stood, as in an awful dream,
The army of the dead.

White as a sea-fog, landward bound,
The spectral camp was seen,
And, with a sorrowful, deep sound,
The river flowed between.

No other voice nor sound was there,
No drum, nor sentry's pace;
The mist-like banners clasped the air,
As clouds with clouds embrace.

But when the old cathedral bell
Proclaimed the morning prayer,
The white pavilions rose and fell
On the alarmed air.

Down the broad valley fast and far
The troubled army fled;
Up rose the glorious morning star,
The ghastly host was dead.

I have read, in the marvellous heart of man,
That strange and mystic scroll,
That an army of phantoms vast and wan
Beleaguer the human soul.

Encamped beside Life's rushing stream,
In Fancy's misty light,
Gigantic shapes and shadows gleam
Portentous through the night.

Upon its midnight battle-ground
The spectral camp is seen,
And, with a sorrowful, deep sound,
Flows the River of Life between.

No other voice nor sound is there,
In the army of the grave;
No other challenge breaks the air,
But the rushing of Life's wave.

And when the solemn and deep churchbell
Entreats the soul to pray,
The midnight phantoms feel the spell,
The shadows sweep away.

Down the broad Vale of Tears afar
The spectral camp is fled;
Faith shineth as a morning star,
Our ghastly fears are dead.

poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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Voices Of The Night : The Beleaguered City