The Tomb

So rest, forever rest, O princely pair!In your high church, ’mid the still mountain-air,Where horn, and hound, and vassals, never come.Only the blessed saints are smiling dumbFrom the rich painted windows of the naveOn aisle, and transept, and your marble grave;Where thou, young prince, shalt never more ariseFrom the fringed mattress where thy duchess lies,On autumn-mornings, when the bugle sounds,And ride across the drawbridge with thy houndsTo hunt the boar in the crisp woods till eve;And thou, O princess, shalt no more receive,Thou and thy ladies, in the hall of state,The jaded hunters with their bloody freight,Coming benighted to the castle-gate.So sleep, forever sleep, O marble pair!Or, if ye wake, let it be then, when fairOn the carved western front a flood of lightStreams from the setting sun, and colors brightProphets, transfigured saints, and martyrs brave,In the vast western window of the nave;And on the pavement round the tomb there glintsA checker-work of glowing sapphire-tints,And amethyst, and ruby,--then uncloseYour eyelids on the stone where ye repose,And from your broidered pillows lift your heads,And rise upon your cold white marble beds;And looking down on the warm rosy tintsWhich checker, at your feet, the illumined flints,Say, What is this? we are in bliss--forgiven--Behold the pavement of the courts of heaven!Or let it be on autumn-nights, when rainDoth rustlingly above your heads complainOn the smooth leaden roof, and on the wallsShedding her pensive light at intervalsThe moon through the clere-story windows shines,And the wind washes through the mountain-pines,--Then, gazing up ’mid the dim pillars high,The foliaged marble forest where ye lie,Hush, ye will say, it is eternity!This is the glimmering verge of heaven, and theseThe columns of the heavenly palaces.And in the sweeping of the wind your earThe passage of the angels’ wings will hear,And on the lichen-crusted leads aboveThe rustle of the eternal rain of love.