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Leaves of Grass (1891-92)
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THE PALLID WREATH.
SOMEHOW I cannot let it go yet, funeral though it is, |
Let it remain back there on its nail suspended, |
With pink, blue, yellow, all blanch'd, and the white now gray
and ashy,
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One wither'd rose put years ago for thee, dear friend; |
But I do not forget thee. Hast thou then faded? |
Is the odor exhaled? Are the colors, vitalities, dead? |
No, while memories subtly play—the past vivid as ever; |
For but last night I woke, and in that spectral ring saw thee, |
Thy smile, eyes, face, calm, silent, loving as ever: |
So let the wreath hang still awhile within my eye-reach, |
It is not yet dead to me, nor even pallid. |
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