Oh, let me not die young!
Full-hearted, yet without a tongue,--
Thy green earth stretched before my feet, untrod,--
Thy blue sky bending over,
As her most tender lover,
With infinite meaning in its starry eyes,
Full of thy silent majesty, O God!
And wild, weird whispers from the solemn deep
Of the Great Sea ascending, with the sweep
Of the Wind-angel's wings across the skies,
Burdened with hints of awful memories,
Whose half-guessed grandeur thrills us till we weep!--
I love thy marvellous world too well--
Its sunny nooks of hill and dell,
Its majesty of mountains, and the swell
Of volumed waters--for my heart to yearn
Away from the deep truth which veils its splendor
In beauty there less dazzling, but more tender.
With grave delight I turn
To all its glories, from the tiniest bloom
Whose hour-long life just sweetens its own tomb
As with funereal spices,
To the far stars which burn
And blossom in fire through their vast periods,--
Borne in thy palm,
Like the pale lotus in the hand of Isis,
When throned white, and calm,
In solemn conclave of the mythic gods.

Oh, let me not die young,