Stanzas On the Death of Miss Campbell

Letitia Elizabeth Landon 1802 (Chelsea) – 1838 (Cape Coast)



Rose of our love, how soon thou art faded,
The blight has past over thy April bloom,
Where are the hopes that dwelt on thee, all shaded,
The hearts which they brightened are dark as thy tomb.

We saw thee with youth, health, and happiness glowing,
We saw thee again, but health was no more,
Sadness was round thee, and warm tears were flowing,
O'er the wan cheek whose bloom their dew could not restore.

Still on thy face, while others wept round thee,
Was the look that would soothe, the smile that would cheer,
Each hour loosed the chain, that unto this life bound thee,
And each hour we found thee more dear, and more dear.

Where art thou now, in the silent grave sleeping,
Cold, long and dark this last slumber will be;
Wild o'er thy sod, thy pale mother is weeping,
The joy of her life has departed with thee.

Fare thee well, tho' we mourn o'er the promising blossom,
Sadly and fondly its memory enshrine;
Was it not better to part with a bosom
So free from earth's taints and earth's sorrow's as thine.

Was it not better to part with thy spirit,
All piety, purity, patience, and love?—
Will not the meek and the gentle inherit
A crown of life fadeless and holy above?
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Submitted by Madeleine Quinn on October 24, 2019

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:07 min read
17

Quick analysis:

Scheme XAXA BCBC DEDE BDBD FGFG HIHI
Closest metre Iambic hexameter
Characters 1,172
Words 220
Stanzas 6
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4

Letitia Elizabeth Landon

Letitia Elizabeth Landon was an English poet. Born 14th August 1802 at 25 Hans Place, Chelsea, she lived through the most productive period of her life nearby, at No.22. A precocious child with a natural gift for poetry, she was driven by the financial needs of her family to become a professional writer and thus a target for malicious gossip (although her three children by William Jerdan were successfully hidden from the public). In 1838, she married George Maclean, governor of Cape Coast Castle on the Gold Coast, whence she travelled, only to die a few months later (15th October) of a fatal heart condition. Behind her post-Romantic style of sentimentality lie preoccupations with art, decay and loss that give her poetry its characteristic intensity and in this vein she attempted to reinterpret some of the great male texts from a woman’s perspective. Her originality rapidly led to her being one of the most read authors of her day and her influence, commencing with Tennyson in England and Poe in America, was long-lasting. However, Victorian attitudes led to her poetry being misrepresented and she became excluded from the canon of English literature, where she belongs. more…

All Letitia Elizabeth Landon poems | Letitia Elizabeth Landon Books

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