Life and Existence

You must lie upon the daisies and discourse in novel phrases of your complicated state of mind, The meaning doesn’t matter if it’s only idle chatter of a transcendental kind. And everyone will say, As you walk your mystic way, “If this young man expresses himself in terms too deep for me, Why, what a very singularly deep young man this deep young man must be!”

Child of the pure, unclouded brow And dreaming eyes of wonder! Though time be fleet and I and thou Are half a life asunder, Thy loving smile will surely hail The love-gift of a fairy tale.

Sleeping at last, the trouble and turmoil over, Sleeping at last, the struggle and horror past, Cold and white, out of sight of friend and of lover, Sleeping at last.

Better by far you should forget and smile Than that you should remember and be sad.

Oh roses for the flush of youth, And laurel for the perfect prime; But pluck an ivy branch for me Grown old before my time.

Oh roses for the flush of youth, And laurel for the perfect prime; But pluck an ivy branch for me Grown old before my time.

Remember me when I am gone away, Gone far away into the silent land.

Remember me when I am gone away, Gone far away into the silent land.

When I am dead, my dearest, Sing no sad songs for me; Plant thou no roses at my head, Nor shady cypress tree. Be the green grass above me With showers and dewdrops wet; And if thou wilt, remember And if thou wilt, forget.

When I am dead, my dearest, Sing no sad songs for me; Plant thou no roses at my head, Nor shady cypress tree. Be the green grass above me With showers and dewdrops wet; And if thou wilt, remember And if thou wilt, forget.

The only secret people keep Is Immortality.

The only secret people keep Is Immortality.

That it will never come again Is what makes life so sweet.

I took one Draught of Life— I’ll tell you what I paid— Precisely an existence— The market price, they said. They weighed me, Dust by Dust— They balanced Film with Film, Then handed me my Being’s worth— A single Dram of Heaven!

My life closed twice before its close— It yet remains to see If Immortality unveil A third event to me So huge, so hopeless to conceive As these that twice befell. Parting is all we know of heaven, And all we need of hell.

My life closed twice before its close— It yet remains to see If Immortality unveil A third event to me So huge, so hopeless to conceive As these that twice befell. Parting is all we know of heaven, And all we need of hell.

A Drunkard cannot meet a Cork Without a Revery— And so encountering a Fly This January Day Jamaicas of Remembrance stir That send me reeling in.

Eden is that old-fashioned House We dwell in every day Without suspecting our abode Until we drive away.

A little Madness in the Spring Is wholesome even for the King.

Until the Desert knows That Water grows His Sands suffice But let him once suspect That Caspian Fact Sahara dies.

A word is dead When it is said, Some say. I say it just Begins to live That day.

The Bustle in a House The Morning after Death Is solemnest of industries Enacted upon Earth— The Sweeping up the Heart, And putting Love away We shall not want to use again Until Eternity.

I never saw a Moor— I never saw the Sea— Yet know I how the Heather looks And what a Billow be. I never spoke with God Nor visited in Heaven— Yet certain am I of the spot As if the Checks were given—

But never met this Fellow Attended or alone Without a tighter breathing And Zero at the Bone—