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PHAON IN HADES, by             Poem Explanation         Poet's Biography
First Line: To-day the very dead would love his face
Last Line: Of blame, were I to love his beauty less!
Subject(s): Beauty; Death; Faces; Hades; Persephone; Tears; Dead, The; Proserpine; Proserpina


To-day the very dead would love his face;
And, loving them, I wish that to their place
Of woe his feet might find awhile the way,
And ease them with perfection for a space.
His beauty is so beautiful to-day.

As, when its freight of dew is blown away,
The grass uprises, so would they uprise,
Those ancient dead, and shake their anguish grey,
Breathing his coolness and his glad surprise
As 'twere the blow and glittering of day.

Ashine with clinging petals and late tears,
Sweet with aroma of Sicilian green,
I see the dear, dear dead make way and lean
To catch the summer of his mouth, the sheen
Of laughter in those eyes that wisdom fears.

And, ah! Persephone! She hath forgot
The pallor and the poppied heaviness --
Upon her wine-red heart her hand is hot.
If thus the very dead, 'twere sure excess
Of blame, were I to love his beauty less!





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