Dirge for the Year Departed.....

The winds have wept a mournful dirge
The seas have moaned a madrigal
The pale moon and the stars converge
To join this tongue-less musical
The hill a quiet vigil keeps
As the last fading minute weeps……

And here we gather throng on throng
In solemn, pensive reverie
The trite expression of the tongue
Cannot beckon now to thee
Slipping through Time’s misty veil
Silent beauty; ethereal

So what of fiercest tears we’ve shed
What of the dew-drop or the rose
They are as laughter of the dead
Obscure in history’s repose
All that has been again will be
Such is this mortality

Then ash to ash and dust to dust
The fair and evil quickly pass
And all the mortal gains we trust
Are temporal as the terrene grass
On this veiled porch mankind must wait
And dream and search and contemplate……..

….the purpose of this fleeting hour
The deeper meaning of it all
Life; the picture of a flower
The seed, the bud, the bloom, the fall
As one more quick year softly slips
From the whisper of our lips

Some lift their glass to lesser gods
And praise the merits of their lust
Forgetting, ‘neath their feet the sod
Waits to reclaim their wealth of dust
But wiser men humbly resign
Their dividends to One divine…..

Though winds may weep a mournful dirge
Though seas may quote a madrigal
Time and eternity converge
Somewhere beyond this darkened veil
Life does not end beneath the sod
Time is our pathway up to God…………..

Janet~