Gone
by Adam Lindsay Gordon
IN Collins Street standeth a statute tall,
A statue tall, on a pillar of stone,
Telling its story, to great and small,
Of the dust reclaimed from the sand waste lone;
Weary and wasted, and worn and wan,
Feeble and faint, and languid and low,
He lay on the desert a dying man;
Who has gone, my friends, where we all must go.
There are perils by land, and perils by water,
Short, I ween, are the obsequies
Of the landsman lost, but they may be shorter
With the mariner lost in the trackless seas;
And well for him, when the timbers start,
And the stout ship reels and settles below,
Who goes to his doom with as bold a heart,
As that dead man gone where we all must go.
Man is stubborn his rights to yield,
And redder than dews at eventide
Are the dews of battle, shed on the field,
By a nation’s wrath or a despot’s pride;
But few who have heard their death-knell roll,
From the cannon’s lips where they faced the foe,
Have fallen as stout and steady of soul,
As that dead man gone where we all must go.
Traverse yon spacious burial ground,
Many are sleeping soundly there,
Who pass’d with mourners standing around,
Kindred, and friends, and children fair;
Did he envy such ending? ’twere hard to say;
Had he cause to envy such ending? no;
Can the spirit feel for the senseless clay,
When it once has gone where we all must go?
What matters the sand or the whitening chalk,
The blighted herbage, the black’ning log,
The crooked beak of the eagle-hawk,
Or the hot red tongue of the native dog?
That couch was rugged, those sextons rude,
Yet, in spite of a leaden shroud, we know
That the bravest and fairest are earth-worms’ food,
When once they’ve gone where we all must go.
With the pistol clenched in his failing hand,
With the death mist spread o’er his fading eyes,
He saw the sun go down on the sand,
And he slept, and never saw it rise;
’Twas well; he toil’d till his task was done,
Constant and calm in his latest throe,
The storm was weathered, the battle was won,
When he went, my friends, where we all must go.
God grant that whenever, soon or late,
Our course is run and our goal is reach’d,
We may meet our fate as steady and straight
As he whose bones in yon desert bleach’d;
No tears are needed—our cheeks are dry,
We have none to waste upon living woe;
Shall we sigh for one who has ceased to sigh,
Having gone, my friends, where we all must go?
We tarry yet, we are toiling still,
He is gone and he fares the best,
He fought against odds, he struggled up hill,
He has fairly earned his season of rest;
No tears are needed—fill our the wine,
Let the goblets clash, and the grape juice flow,
Ho! pledge me a death-drink, comrade mine,
To a brave man gone where we all must go.
A few random poems:
- Михаил Кузмин – Зимнее солнце
- Ольга Берггольц – Ни до серебряной и ни до золотой
- Ольга Высотская – Детский сад
- Михаил Лермонтов – Булевар
- Love Sonnet LIV poem – Zora Bernice May Cross poems | Poetry Monster
- Омар Хайям – Меняем реки, страны, города
- Sonnet 01 poem – John Milton poems
- How Many Bards Gild The Lapses Of Time! poem – John Keats poems
- Владимир Маяковский – Помогите цинготным детям (Главполитпросвет №274)
- November by William Cullen Bryant
- Степан Щипачев – Обращение к времени
- The Skies by William Cullen Bryant
- Камышева Ю. – На далёком полюсе, где метёт пурга
- Sonnet To Sleep poem – John Keats poems
- Ballad of the Goodly Fere poem – Ezra Pound poems
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- Жан де Лафонтен – Садовод и Помещик
- Жан де Лафонтен – Пьяница и Жена его
- Жан де Лафонтен – Предостережение богов Симониду
- Жан де Лафонтен – Павлин, жалующийся Юноне
- Жан де Лафонтен – Осел со священной ношей
- Жан де Лафонтен – Осел и Собака
- Жан де Лафонтен – Орел и Сова
- Жан де Лафонтен – Орел, Дикая Свинья и Кошка
- Жан де Лафонтен – Обезьяна и Дельфин
- Жан де Лафонтен – Мужчина средних лет и его две Возлюбленные
- Жан де Лафонтен – Мельник, Сын его и Осел
- Жан де Лафонтен – Львиный указ
- Жан де Лафонтен – Лисица, Мухи и Еж
- Жан де Лафонтен – Лисица и Аист
- Жан де Лафонтен – Лев, сраженный Человеком
- Жан де Лафонтен – Лес и Дровосек
- Жан де Лафонтен – Ласочка в амбаре
- Жан де Лафонтен – Кошка, превращенная в женщину
- Жан де Лафонтен – Карман
- Жан де Лафонтен – Городская и полевая Крысы
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
Adam Lindsay Gordon (1833 – 1870) was an Australian or British-Australian poet, horseman, police officer and politician. He is considered to be one of the first national Australian poets.