Addressed to his deceased wife, who died in childbed at the age of twenty-two.
To make my lady's obsequies
My love a minster wrought, And, in the chantry, service there
Was sung by doleful thought; The tapers were of burning sighs,
That light and odor gave: And sorrows, painted o'er with tears,
Enluminèd her grave; And round about, in quaintest guise,
Was carved: "Within this tomb there lies
The fairest thing in mortal eyes."
Above her lieth spread a tomb
Of gold and sapphires blue: The gold doth show her blessedness,
The sapphires mark her true; For blessedness and truth in her
Were livelily portrayed, When gracious God with both his hands
Her goodly substance made. He framed her in such wondrous wise,
She was, to speak without disguise,
The fairest thing in mortal eyes.
No more, no more! my heart doth faint
When I the life recall Of her who lived so free from taint,
So virtuous deemed by all,— That in herself was so complete I think that she was ta'en By God to deck his paradise,
And with his saints to reign, Whom while on earth each one did prize
The fairest thing in mortal eyes.
But naught our tears avail, or cries;
All soon or late in death shall sleep; Nor living wight long time may keep The fairest thing in mortal eyes.
From the French of CHARLES, DUKE OF ORLEANS.
Translation of HENRY FRANCIS CARY.
Break, break, break,
On thy cold gray stones, O sea! And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.
O well for the fisherman's boy
That he shouts with his sister at play! O well for the sailor lad
That he sings in his boat on the bay!
And the stately ships go on,
To the haven under the hill; But O for the touch of a vanished hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!