09-18-2013, 02:36 AM
The poem "Love and Death" describes a brief encounter between love and death personified. Love first spots death beneath a yew one night "talking to himself". Death tells Love, "You must begone, these walks are mine." Love before flying away tells him what I suppose contains the message of the poem namely that love conquers all and rules on through eternity,
This hour is thine;
Thou art the shadow of life, and as the tree
Stands in the sun and shadows all beneath,
So in the light of great eternity
Life eminent creates the shade of death;
The shadow passeth when the tree shall fall,
But I shall reign for ever over all."
The way the poem compares a tree in the sun casting a shadow on all beneath it to how life creates the shadow of death in the light of eternity is meaningful.
But what does it mean?
I suppose it means that death the "shadow of life" appears as grim truth in the light of reality-- a looming certainty that as a shadow obscures and veils the eternal nature of all things from the eyes of man. It shadows all, threatening life yet life continues on through eternity. Life "eminent" is a part of eternity however irreconciable life and eternity may seem in the shadow of death and divorced from the "light of great eternity".
I think this poem is quite similar in theme to the poem Nothing Will Die which is that life is ever-changing through eternity without beginning or end:
When will the stream be aweary of flowing
Under my eye?
When will the wind be aweary of blowing
Over the sky?
When will the clouds be aweary of fleeting?
When will the heart be aweary of beating?
And nature die?
Never, oh! never, nothing will die?
The stream flows,
The wind blows,
The cloud fleets,
The heart beats,
Nothing will die.
Nothing will die;
All things will change
Through eternity.
'Tis the world's winter;
Autumn and summer
Are gone long ago;
Earth is dry to the centre,
But spring, a new comer,
A spring rich and strange,
Shall make the winds blow
Round and round,
Through and through,
Here and there,
Till the air
And the ground
Shall be filled with life anew.
The world was never made;
It will change, but it will not fade.
So let the wind range;
For even and morn
Ever will be
Through eternity.
Nothing was born;
Nothing will die;
All things will change.
What are your thoughts?
Here is the poem Love and Death in full:
What time the mighty moon was gathering light
Love paced the thymy plots of Paradise,
And all about him roll'd his lustrous eyes;
When, turning round a cassia, full in view
Death, walking all alone beneath a yew,
And talking to himself, first met his sight:
"You must begone," said Death, "these walks are mine".
Love wept and spread his sheeny vans for flight;
Yet ere he parted said, "This hour is thine;
Thou art the shadow of life, and as the tree
Stands in the sun and shadows all beneath,
So in the light of great eternity
Life eminent creates the shade of death;
The shadow passeth when the tree shall fall,
But I shall reign for ever over all".
This hour is thine;
Thou art the shadow of life, and as the tree
Stands in the sun and shadows all beneath,
So in the light of great eternity
Life eminent creates the shade of death;
The shadow passeth when the tree shall fall,
But I shall reign for ever over all."
The way the poem compares a tree in the sun casting a shadow on all beneath it to how life creates the shadow of death in the light of eternity is meaningful.
But what does it mean?
I suppose it means that death the "shadow of life" appears as grim truth in the light of reality-- a looming certainty that as a shadow obscures and veils the eternal nature of all things from the eyes of man. It shadows all, threatening life yet life continues on through eternity. Life "eminent" is a part of eternity however irreconciable life and eternity may seem in the shadow of death and divorced from the "light of great eternity".
I think this poem is quite similar in theme to the poem Nothing Will Die which is that life is ever-changing through eternity without beginning or end:
When will the stream be aweary of flowing
Under my eye?
When will the wind be aweary of blowing
Over the sky?
When will the clouds be aweary of fleeting?
When will the heart be aweary of beating?
And nature die?
Never, oh! never, nothing will die?
The stream flows,
The wind blows,
The cloud fleets,
The heart beats,
Nothing will die.
Nothing will die;
All things will change
Through eternity.
'Tis the world's winter;
Autumn and summer
Are gone long ago;
Earth is dry to the centre,
But spring, a new comer,
A spring rich and strange,
Shall make the winds blow
Round and round,
Through and through,
Here and there,
Till the air
And the ground
Shall be filled with life anew.
The world was never made;
It will change, but it will not fade.
So let the wind range;
For even and morn
Ever will be
Through eternity.
Nothing was born;
Nothing will die;
All things will change.
What are your thoughts?
Here is the poem Love and Death in full:
What time the mighty moon was gathering light
Love paced the thymy plots of Paradise,
And all about him roll'd his lustrous eyes;
When, turning round a cassia, full in view
Death, walking all alone beneath a yew,
And talking to himself, first met his sight:
"You must begone," said Death, "these walks are mine".
Love wept and spread his sheeny vans for flight;
Yet ere he parted said, "This hour is thine;
Thou art the shadow of life, and as the tree
Stands in the sun and shadows all beneath,
So in the light of great eternity
Life eminent creates the shade of death;
The shadow passeth when the tree shall fall,
But I shall reign for ever over all".
