Classic Poem

Medora, wake! — nay, do not wake!
I would not stir that placid brow,
Nor lift those lids, though light should break
Warm from the twin blue heavens that lie below.

Sleep falls on thee, as on the streams
The summer moon. Touched by its might,
The soul comes out in loving dreams,
And wraps thy delicate form in living light.

Thou art not dead! — These flowers say
That thou, though more thou heed'st them not,
Didst rear them once for him away,
Then loose them in thy hold like things forgot,

And lay thee here where thou might'st weep, —
That Death but hushed thee to repose,
As mothers tend their infants' sleep,
And watch their eyelids falter, open, close, —

That here thy heart hath found release,
Thy sorrows all are gone away,
Or touched by something almost peace,
Like night's last shadows by the gleaming day.

When he who gave thee form is gone,
And I within the earth shall lie,
Thou still shalt slumber softly on,
Too fair to live, too beautiful to die.