  I shall lie so one day, With lips of Silence set; Eyes that no tear can wet Again: a thing of Clay. I shall lie so, and Earth Will seize again her dust— Though she must gnaw and rust The coffin's iron girth. I shall lie so—and they Who still the Day bestride, Will stand so by my side And with sad yearning say: "What is he now, this man, Shut in a pallor there, His spirit that could dare, What—what now is its span? "A withered atom's space Within a withered brain? Or can it from the Wain To far Orion race?" And, like all that have died, I shall but answer—naught. Yet Time this truth has taught: The Question—will abide. |
|
