The Last Verses

O ageless nonpareil of stars That shinest through a mist of cloud, O light beyond the prison bars Remote, unwavering, and proud; Fortunate star and happy light, Ye benison the gloom of night.

All hail, unfailing eye and hand, All hail, all hail, unsilenced voice, That makest dead men understand, The very dead in graves rejoice: Whose utterance, writ in ancient books, Shall always live, for him that looks.

Many as leaves from autumn trees The years shall flutter from on high, And with their multiple decease The souls of men shall fall and die, Yet, while the empires turn to dust, You shall live on, because you must.

O seven times happy he that dies After the splendid harvest-tide, When strong barns shield from winter skies The grain that's rightly stored inside: There death shall scatter no more tears Than o'er the falling of the years:

Aye, happy seven times is he Who enters not the silent doors Before his time, but tenderly Death beckons unto him, because There's rest within for weary feet Now all the journey is complete.