Friday, August 22, 2008

WHEN I AM DEAD, MY DEAREST by Christina G. Rossetti

WHEN I AM DEAD, MY DEAREST

When I am dead, my dearest,

Sing no sad songs for me;

Plant thou no roses at my head,

Nor shady cypress tree:

Be the green gr
ass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;

And if thou wilt, remember,

And if thou wilt, forget.


I shall not see the shadows,

I shall not
feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale

Sing on, as if in pain:

And dreaming through the twilight

That doth not
rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,

And haply may forget.


Christina Georgina Rossetti

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Naiimagine ko while pounding your keyboard you were mumbling each word. It's a very touchy poem. I like it very much. I will always remember now that it was written by C. G. Rossetti and not by E. B. Browning.

Anonymous said...

Christina Georgina Rossetti a.k.a Ellen Alleyne, was the sister of Pre-Raphaelite painter and poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti. She's known for a brooding melancholic taste in most of her poems. She also wrote nursery rhymes
and tales for children.
Watch and listen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PAAB30hH84

Bay Martin said...

@ Monching,

How did you know? Not only that, while typing the poem, my mind was thinking of another poem, entitled The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost. I love this poem, too, an inspiration everytime I make choices.

Bay Martin said...

@ The Man Under the Mango Tree,

Her other brother was William Michael Rossetti, a leading art critic and editor. It was William who edited her complete works in 1904 (10 years after her death).

Her poetry is characterized by an overwhelming sense of melancholy. Some modern readers also find it overly morbid and maudlin.

Her most famous collections not only include Sing-Song, a Nursery Rhyme Book (1872), but also Goblin Market and Other Poems (1862), The Prince's Progress and Other Poems (1866).

The Man Under the Mango Tree said...

Robert Frost = "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"= "Mending Wall"

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I took the one less traveled by, and that has made the difference.
--Robert Frost

This line inspired M. Scott Peck (Morgan Scott Peck) to write his bestselling novel, The Road Less Traveled...

Bay Martin said...

"The Road Not Taken" is a poem by Robert Frost, published in 1916 in his collection Mountain Interval. It is the first poem in the volume, and the first poem Robert Frost had printed in italics.

The title is often misremembered as "The Road Less Traveled", from the penultimate line: "I took the one less traveled by".

Anonymous said...

Thanks for posting the poem. I am beginning to love poetry reading! Sabi mo nga, there is no such as "late." If you love to do something, just do it1 hurray to you, friend!