Author: Oliver Wendell Holmes

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    Her hands are cold; her face is white;
    No more her pulses come and go;
    Her eyes are shut to life and light; - 
    Fold the white vesture, snow on snow,
    And lay her where the violets blow.

    But not beneath a graven stone,
    To plead for tears with alien eyes;
    A slender cross of wood alone
    Shall say, that here a maiden lies
    In peace beneath the peaceful skies.

    And gray old trees of hugest limb
    Shall wheel their circling shadows round
    To make the scorching sunlight dim
    That drinks the greenness from the ground,
    And drop their dead leaves on her mound.

    When o'er their boughs the squirrels run,
    And through their leaves the robins call,
    And, ripening in the autumn sun,
    The acorns and the chestnuts fall,
    Doubt not that she will heed them all.

    For her the morning choir shall sing
    Its matins from the branches high,
    And every minstrel-voice of Spring,
    That trills beneath the April sky,
    Shall greet her with its earliest cry.

    When, turning round their dial-track,
    Eastward the lengthening shadows pass,
    Her little mourners, clad in black,
    The crickets, sliding through the grass,
    Shall pipe for her an evening mass.

    At last the rootlets of the trees
    Shall find the prison where she lies,
    And bear the buried dust they seize
    In leaves and blossoms to the skies.
    So may the soul that warmed it rise!

    If any, born of kindlier blood,
    Should ask, What maiden lies below?
    Say only this: A tender bud,
    That tried to blossom in the snow,
    Lies withered where the violets blow.

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Type of Poem: Elegy

Date Written:

Date Published:

Language: English

Keywords: Public Domain

Source: Public Domain Collection

Publisher:

Rights/Permissions: Public Domain

Comments/Notes: This deeply evocative poem centers around themes of death, nature, and the cyclical aspects of life. The subject, a maiden, is portrayed as having passed away in her youth, her life cut short symbolized by the "tender bud, that tried to blossom in the snow." The stark, cold imagery in the beginning contrasts with the warmer, more comforting imagery later in the poem, indicating a shift from death to rebirth, or a transition from the physical to the spiritual realm.

The poem's tone is solemn and reverent, but also filled with a quiet acceptance of the inevitable. The poet employs various natural elements and imagery to express grief, remembrance, and the continuity of life after death. The "slender cross of wood," the "gray old trees," the "morning choir," and the "crickets" all contribute to a sense of the maiden's presence being absorbed and remembered by the natural world around her.

The structure of the poem, with its regular rhythm and rhyme scheme, adds to the sense of order and cyclicity in nature, reinforcing the theme of life continuing after death. The use of personification and vivid imagery throughout the poem breathes life into the natural elements, enabling them to serve as metaphorical mourners and celebrants of the maiden's life and death. This creates a poignant blend of sorrow and serenity, underscoring the poem's exploration of mortality and the afterlife within the natural world.