The Grave of Shelley by Oscar Wilde
Yesterday I started reading The Fourth Bear by Jasper Fforde. If you’re not familiar with his work, you’re missing out! I knew the book would be chock full of literary references and 50 pages in, I’m not disappointed. There is a hilarious scene with Dorian Gray as a used car salesman. He offers a “unique guarantee” with certain cars that they will never age. The secret is a painting in the trunk. I nearly howled with laughter! Anyway, this poem is certainly not funny, but it is by Oscar Wilde…
The Grave of Shelley
By Oscar Wilde
Like burnt-out torches by a sick man’s bed
Gaunt cypress-trees stand round the sun-bleached stone;
Here doth the little night-owl make her throne,
And the slight lizard show his jewelled head.
And, where the chaliced poppies flame to red,
In the still chamber of yon pyramid
Surely some Old-World Sphinx lurks darkly hid,
Grim warder of this pleasaunce of the dead.
Ah! sweet indeed to rest within the womb
Of Earth, great mother of eternal sleep,
But sweeter far for thee a restless tomb
In the blue cavern of an echoing deep,
Or where the tall ships founder in the gloom
Against the rocks of some wave-shattered steep.
