Page:The Spirit of the Nation.djvu/52

40 III.

Yes, where the sons of Folly bow, at Fashion's empty shrine,

Go, bring thy flimsy heart to sale—it ne'er was formed for mine—

I loathe the idol of the past—I spurn it with disgust—

'Tis shivered into fragments—and trampled into dust!

IV.

Yet no.—I cannot hate thee, tho' thy love no more I prize—

We hate not, as we love not, where we only can despise—

Then crawl in safety, for to me the thought of thee is such,

As of a reptile we would kill, could we but bear to touch!

Shall they bury me in the deep,

Where wind-forgetting waters sleep?

Shall they dig a grave for me,

Under the green-wood tree?

Or on the wild heath,

Where the wilder breath

Of the storm doth blow?

Oh, no! oh, no!

Shall they bury me in the Palace Tombs,

Or under the shade of Cathedral domes?

Sweet 'twere to lie on Italy's shore?

Yet not there—nor in Greece, though I love it more.

In the wolf or the vulture my grave shall I find?

Shall my ashes career on the world-seeing wind?

Shall they fling my corpse in the battle mound,

Where coffinless thousands lie under the ground?