What know we of the dead, who say these things, 
Or of the life in death below the mould-- 
What of the mystic laws that rule the old 
Grey realms beyond our poor imaginings 
Where death is life? The bird with spray-wet wings 
Knows more of what the deeps beneath him hold. 
Let be! Warm hearts shall never wax a-cold, 
But burn in roses through eternal springs; 
For all the vanished fruit and flower of Time 
Are flower and fruit in worlds we cannot see, 
And all we see is as a shadow-mime 
Of things unseen, and Time that comes to flee 
Is but the broken echo of a rhyme 
In God's great epic of Eternity.