Analysis of 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.