Poetry Archives

If we must part, this parting is the best:
How would you bear to lay
Your head on some warm pillow far away—
Your head, so used to lying on my breast?

But now your pillow is cold;
Your hands have flowers, and not my hands, to hold;
Upon our bed the worn bride-linen lies.
I have put the death-money upon your eyes,
So that you should not wake up in the night.
I have bound your face with white;
I have washed you, yes, with water and not with tears,—
Those arms wherein I have slept so many years,
Those feet that hastened when they came to me,
And all your body that belonged to me.
I have smoothed your dear dull hair,
And there is nothing left to say for you
And nothing left to fear or pray for you;
And I have got the rest of life to bear:
Thank God it is you, not I, who are lying there.

If I had died
And you had stood beside
This still white bed
Where the white, scented, horrible flowers are spread,—
I know the thing it is,
And I thank God that He has spared you this.
If one must bear it, thank God it was I
Who had to live and bear to see you die,
Who have to live, and bear to see you dead.

You will have nothing of it all to bear:
You will not even know that in your bed
You lie alone. You will not miss my head
Beside you on the pillow: you will rest
So soft in the grave you will not miss my breast.
But I—but I—Your pillow and your place—
And only the darkness laid against my face,
And only my anguish pressed against my side—
Thank God, thank God, that it was you who died!