WHY are the things that have no death The ones with neither sight nor breath. Eternity is thrust upon A bit of earth, a senseless stone. A grain of dust, a casual clod Receives the greatest gift of God. A pebble in the roadway lies— It never dies. The grass our fathers cut away Is growing on their graves to-day; The tiniest brooks that scarcely flow Eternally will come and go. There is no kind of death to kill The sands that lie so meek and still... But Man is great and strong and wise— And so he dies. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE RIVER-MERCHANT'S WIFE: A LETTER by LI PO DIRGE FOR TWO VETERANS by WALT WHITMAN ON HOMER'S BIRTHPLACE by ANTIPATER OF SIDON TO SLEEP, WHEN SICK OF A FEVER by PHILIP AYRES VALEDICTORY STANZAS TO JOHN P. KEMBLE, ESQ.; FOR A PUBLIC MEETING by THOMAS CAMPBELL |