Poetry Explorer


Classic and Contemporary Poetry


THE SHADOW by RICHARD HENRY STODDARD

Poet Analysis

First Line: THERE IS BUT ONE GREAT SORROW
Last Line: A WOUND THAT NEVER WILL HEAL.

THERE is but one great sorrow,
All over the wide, wide world;
But that in turn must come to all --
The Shadow that moves behind the pall,
A flag that never is furled.

Till he in his marching crosses
The threshold of the door,
Usurps a place in the inner room,
Where he broods in the awful hush and gloom,
Till he goes, and comes no more --

Save this there is no sorrow,
Whatever we think we feel;
But when Death comes all's over:
'T is a blow that we never recover,
A wound that never will heal.



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