Flowers shall hang upon the pawls

Flowers shall hang upon the pawls
Brighter than patterns upon shawls
And blossoms shall be in the coffin lids
Sadder than tears on grief’s eyelids
Garlands shall hide pale corps faces
When beauty shall rot in charnel places
Spring flowers shall come in dews of sorrow
For the maiden goes down to her grave tomorrow

Last week she went walking and stepping along
Gay as first flowers of spring or the tune of a song
Her eye was as bright as the sun in its calm
Her lips they were rubies her bosom was warm
And white as the snowdrop that lies on her breast
Now death like a dream is her bedfellow guest
And white as the sheets—aye and paler than they
Now her face in its beauty has perished to clay

Spring flowers they shall hang on her pawl
More bright than the pattern that bloom'd on her shawl
And blooms shall be strewn where the corps lies hid
More sad than the tears upon grief’s eyelid
And ere the return of another sweet May
Shall be rotting to dust in the coffined clay
And the grave whereon the bright snowdrops grow
Shall be the same soil as the beauty below

11th Feb 1847