Algernon Charles Swinburn

In Memory of Walter Savage Landor

Back to the flower-town, side by side,
      The bright months bring,
   New-born, the bridegroom and the bride,
      Freedom and spring.
    The sweet land laughs from sea to sea,
      Filled full of sun;
   All things come back to her, being free;
      All things but one.
    In many a tender wheaten plot
     Flowers that were dead
  Live, and old suns revive; but not
     That holier head.
 
   By this white wandering waste of sea,
     Far north, I hear
  One face shall never turn to me
     As once this year:
 
   Shall never smile and turn and rest
     On mine as there,
  Nor one most sacred hand be prest
     Upon my hair.
 
   I came as one whose thoughts half linger,
     Half run before;
  The youngest to the oldest singer
     That England bore.
 
   I found him whom I shall not find
     Till all grief end,
  In holiest age our mightiest mind,
     Father and friend.
 
   But thou, if anything endure,
     If hope there be,
  O spirit that man’s life left pure,
     Man’s death set free,
 
   Not with disdain of days that were
     Look earthward now;
  Let dreams revive the reverend hair,
     The imperial brow;
 
   Come back in sleep, for in the life
     Where thou art not
  We find none like thee. Time and strife
     And the world’s lot
 
   Move thee no more; but love at least
     And reverent heart
  May move thee, royal and released,
     Soul, as thou art.
 
   And thou, his Florence, to thy trust
     Receive and keep,
  Keep safe his dedicated dust,
     His sacred sleep.
 
   So shall thy lovers, come from far,
     Mix with thy name
  As morning-star with evening-star
     His faultless fame.
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