D’Outre tombe

BESIDE my grave, if chance should ever bring you,
    You, peradventure, on some dim Spring day,
What song of welcome could my blackbird sing you,
    As once in May ?

As once in May, when all the birds were calling,
    Calling and crying through the soft Spring rain,
As once in Autumn with the dead leaves falling
    In wood and lane.

I, in my grave, and you, above, remember—
    And yet between us what is there to say?—
In Death’s disseverance, wider than December
    Disparts from May.

I with the dead, and you among the living,
    In separate camps we sojourn, unallied ;
Life is unkind and Death is unforgiving,
    And both divide.