The Grave of Keats

1881

Rid of the world's injustice, and his pain,He rests at last beneath God's veil of blue:Taken from life when life and love were newThe youngest of the martyrs here is lain,Fair as Sebastian, and as early slain.No cypress shades his grave, no funeral yew,But gentle violets weeping with the dewWeave on his bones an ever-blossoming chain.O proudest heart that broke for misery!O sweetest lips since those of Mitylene!O poet-painter of our English Land!Thy name was writ in water——it shall stand:And tears like mine will keep thy memory green,As Isabella did her Basil-tree.

From The Poems of Oscar Wilde (1881), via the English Wikisource transcription.

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