He died: he went from all the praise
That fell on ears unheeding,
And scarcely can we read his lays
For pauses in the reading,
To mourn the buds of poesy,
That never came to blushing;
For who can choose but sigh, ah me!
For their untimely crushing!

And when we see, o'er ruins dim,
The summer roses climbing,
We sadly pause, and think of him,
The beauty of whose rhyming
Spread sunshine o'er the darkest ill,—
Alas! it could not cover
The heart from breaking, that was still
Through all despairs a lover—

A lover of the beautiful,
In nature's sweet evangels;
For his great heart was worshipful,
For men, and for the angels.
The rank with him was not the man,
He knew no servile bowing;
And wee things o'er the furrow ran
Unharmed beside his plowing.

Lights flowing out of palaces
Dimmed not the candles burning,
Whereby the glorious mysteries
Of music he was learning;
And not witHenvious looks he eyed
The morning larks upgoing,
From meadows that were all too wide
And green for peasant mowing.

For by his cabin door the grass
Was pleasant with the daisies;
And o'er the brae, some bonny lass
Was happy in his praises.
Oh Thou who hear'st my simple strain,
The while I muse his story—
Here knew he all a poet's pain,
Grant now he have the glory!