To A Violet Found On All Saint's Day



Belated wanderer of the ways of spring,
Lost in the chill of grim November rain,
Would I could read the message that you bring
And find in it the antidote for pain.

Does some sad spirit out beyond the day,
Far looking to the hours forever dead,
Send you a tender offering to lay
Upon the grave of us, the living dead?

Or does some brighter spirit, unforlorn,
Send you, my little sister of the wood,
To say to some one on a cloudful morn,
'Life lives through death, my brother, all is good?'

With meditative hearts the others go
The memory of their dead to dress anew.
But, sister mine, bide here that I may know,
Life grows, through death, as beautiful as you.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

38 sec read
108

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABAB CDCD BEXE FGFG
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 653
Words 128
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4

Paul Laurence Dunbar

Paul Laurence Dunbar was a seminal American poet of the late 19th and early 20th centuries Dunbar gained national recognition for his 1896 Lyrics of a Lowly Life one poem in the collection being Ode to Ethiopia more…

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    "To A Violet Found On All Saint's Day" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Mar. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/28975/to-a-violet-found-on-all-saint's-day>.

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