Letitia Elizabeth Landon

“ But not the same, as when, with summer flowers
And scented lamp, she sought the river side;
But pale and silent, like a shadowy thing
That has looked on the other world, and known
The secrets of the grave, but forced, awhile,
To linger on the earth it loathes. ”

“ Which sains and smooths the passage to the grave.
Aye, one sleeps there,—if sleep it can be named,
By which one half of waking life is shamed.
Is that death, where the spirit stays behind,
With much as ever influence on its kind!
How can he die,—he who has left his soul
On the rich canvass, or the breathing scroll!
What is our life—our being—but the spirit,
All of our native heaven we inherit!
How can we die,—yet leave behind us all
The intellect that lit our earthly thrall!
That seems like death, which leaves behind it nought ”

“ With all its sleeping flowers, its dews, its clouds,
Touched with the sunset's crimson lingering,—
Or, when it came with its gay lighted hearth,
Sweet with the burning of the cedar wood,
Her voice was cheerful, as the sunny song
The lark pours to the morning and his mate ”