  The ancient songs Pass deathward mournfully. Cold lips that sing no more, and withered wreaths, Regretful eyes, and drooping breasts and wings— Symbols of ancient songs Mournfully passing Down to the great white surges, Watched of none Save the frail sea-birds And the lithe pale girls, Daughters of Okeanus. And the songs pass From the green land Which lies upon the waves as a leaf On the flowers of hyacinth; And they pass from the waters, The manifold winds and the dim moon, And they come, Silently winging through soft Kimmerian dusk, To the quiet level lands That she keeps for us all, That she wrought for us all for sleep In the silver days of the earth’s dawning— Proserpina, daughter of Zeus. And we turn from the Kuprian’s breasts, Phoibos Apollon, And we turn from the music of old And the hills that we loved and the meads, And we turn from the fiery day, And the lips that were over sweet; For silently Brushing the fields with red-shod feet, With purple robe Searing the flowers as with a sudden flame, Death, Thou hast come upon us. And of all the ancient songs Passing to the swallow-blue halls By the dark streams of Persephone, This only remains: That we turn to thee, Death, That we turn to thee, singing One last song. O Death, Thou art an healing wind That blowest over white flowers A-tremble with dew; Thou art a wind flowing Over dark leagues of lonely sea; Thou art the dusk and the fragrance; Thou art the lips of love mournfully smiling; Satiate with old desires; Thou art the silence of beauty, And we look no more for the morning We yearn no more for the sun, Since with thy white hands, Death, Thou crownest us with the pallid chaplets, The slim colourless poppies Which in thy garden alone Softly thou gatherest. And silently, And with slow feet approaching, And with bowed head and unlit eyes, We kneel before thee: And thou, leaning towards us, Caressingly layest upon us Flowers from thy thin cold hands, And, smiling as a chaste woman Knowing love in her heart, Thou sealest our eyes And the illimitable quietude Comes gently upon us. Richard Aldington
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