Alas! that all we loved of him should be,
But for our grief, as if it had not been,
And grief itself be mortal! Woe is me!
Whence are we, and why are we? of what scene
The actors or spectators? Great and mean
Meet massed in death, who lends what life must
borrow.

Soaring and screaming round her empty nest, As Albion wails for thee: the curse of Cain Light on his head who pierced thy innocent breast,

And scared the angel soul that was its earthly guest!

XVIII.

Ah woe is me! Winter is come and gone,
But grief returns with the revolving year;
The airs and streams renew their joyous tone;
The ants, the bees, the swallows reappear;
Fresh leaves and flowers deck the dead Season's
bier;

The amorous birds now pair in every brake, And build their mossy homes in field and brere, And the green lizard and the golden snake, Like unimprisoned flames, out of their trance awake.

As long as skies are blue, and fields are green, Evening must usher night, night urge the morrow,

to sorrow.

XXII.

He will awake no more, oh, never more!

"Wake thon," cried Misery; "childless Mother, rise Out of thy sleep, and slake, in thy heart's core, A wound more fierce than his with tears and sighs."

And all the Dreams that watched Urania's eyes, And all the Echoes whom their sister's song Had held in holy silence, cried: "Arise!" Swift as a thought by the snake Memory stung, From her ambrosial rest the fading Splendor sprung.

XXIII.

She rose like an autumnal Night, that springs Out of the East, and follows wild and drear The golden Day, which, on eternal wings,