I
��ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING
686 Grief
TELL you, hopeless grief is passionless; That only men incredulous of despair,
Half-taught in anguish, through the midnight air Beat upward to God's throne in loud access Of shrieking and reproach. Full desertness
In souls as countries heth silent-bare
Under the blanching, vertical eye-glare Of the absolute Heavens. Deep-hearted man, express Grief for thy Dead in silence like to Death
Most like a monumental statue set In everlasting watch and moveless woe Till itself crumble to the dust beneath.
Touch it; the marble eyelids are not wet: If it could weep, it could arise and go.
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��68 j A Musical Instrument
rHAT was he doing, the great god Pan, Down in the reeds by the rivei : Spreading rum and scattering ban, Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat, And breaking the golden lilies afloat With the dragon-fly on the river.
He toie out a reed, the great god Pan, From the deep cool bed of the river ; The limpid water turbidly ran, And the broken lilies a-dymg lay, And the dragon-fly had fled away,
Ere he brought it out of the river.
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