Thanatopsis

TO HIM who in the love of Nature holds 
Communion with her visible forms she speaks 
A various language; for his gayer hours 
She has a voice of gladness and a smile 
And eloquence of beauty and she glides 5 
Into his darker musings with a mild 
And healing sympathy that steals away 
Their sharpness ere he is aware.
 When thoughts 
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight 
Over thy spirit and sad images 10 
Of the stern agony and shroud and pall  
And breathless darkness and the narrow house  
Make thee to shudder and grow sick at heart;¡ª 
Go forth under the open sky and list 
To Nature's teachings while from all around¡ª 15 
Earth and her waters and the depths of air¡ª 
Comes a still voice¡ªYet a few days and thee 
The all-beholding sun shall see no more 
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground  
Where thy pale form was laid with many tears 20 
Nor in the embrace of ocean shall exist 
Thy image.
 Earth that nourished thee shall claim 
Thy growth to be resolved to earth again  
And lost each human trace surrendering up 
Thine individual being shalt thou go 25 
To mix forever with the elements; 
To be a brother to the insensible rock  
And to the sluggish clod which the rude swain 
Turns with his share and treads upon.
 The oak 
Shall send his roots abroad and pierce thy mould.
 30 
Yet not to thine eternal resting-place 
Shalt thou retire alone nor couldst thou wish 
Couch more magnificent.
 Thou shalt lie down 
With patriarchs of the infant world ¡ªwith kings  
The powerful of the earth ¡ªthe wise the good 35 
Fair forms and hoary seers of ages past  
All in one mighty sepulchre.
 The hills 
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun; the vales 
Stretching in pensive quietness between; 
The venerable woods¡ªrivers that move 40 
In majesty and the complaining brooks 
That make the meadows green; and poured round all  
Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste ¡ª 
Are but the solemn decorations all 
Of the great tomb of man! The golden sun 45 
The planets all the infinite host of heaven  
Are shining on the sad abodes of death  
Through the still lapse of ages.
 All that tread 
The globe are but a handful to the tribes 
That slumber in its bosom.
¡ªTake the wings 50 
Of morning pierce the Barcan wilderness  
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods 
Where rolls the Oregon and hears no sound  
Save his own dashings ¡ªyet the dead are there: 
And millions in those solitudes since first 55 
The flight of years began have laid them down 
In their last sleep¡ªthe dead reign there alone.
 
So shalt thou rest; and what if thou withdraw 
In silence from the living and no friend 
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe 60 
Will share thy destiny.
 The gay will laugh 
When thou art gone the solemn brood of care 
Plod on and each one as before will chase 
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave 
Their mirth and their employments and shall come 65 
And make their bed with thee.
 As the long train 
Of ages glide away the sons of men  
The youth in life's green spring and he who goes 
In the full strength of years matron and maid  
The speechless babe and the gray-headed man¡ª 70 
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side 
By those who in their turn shall follow them.
 

So live that when thy summons comes to join 
The innumerable caravan which moves 
To that mysterious realm where each shall take 75 
His chamber in the silent halls of death  
Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night  
Scourged to his dungeon but sustained and soothed 
By an unfaltering trust approach thy grave 
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 80 
About him and lies down to pleasant dreams.
 

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