The Dying Christian to His Soul
Vital spark of heav’nly flame!
Quit, O quit this mortal frame:
Trembling, hoping, ling’ring, flying,
O the pain, the bliss of dying!
Cease, fond Nature, cease thy strife,
And let me languish into life.
Hark! they whisper; angels say,
Sister Spirit, come away!
What is this absorbs me quite?
Steals my senses, shuts my sight,
Drowns my spirits, draws my breath?
Tell me, my soul, can this be death?
The world recedes; it disappears!
Heav’n opens on my eyes! my ears
With sounds seraphic ring!
Lend, lend your wings! I mount! I fly!
O Grave! where is thy vict'ry?
O Death! where is thy sting?
The Sinner on His Deathbed
Needed light of earthly shine
Stop, O stop this state, divine
Waiting, wanting, staying, shaking
O the joy, the love of waking
Stay, thou Man, stay in life
And let me lay, through my strife
Stay! It whispers; that I say,
Brother Spirit, stay O stay!
What be this consumes me whole?
Captures my senses, drowns my soul
Kills my spirits, takes my breath?
Now, my spirit, can this be death?
The world advances, it appears!
Earth opens to my sight! My ears
Full of earthly grinding!
Give, give your horse! Myself minding!
O Grave! Show me it, thy loss
O Death! Show me thy cross
Okay, that's just flat out impressive. You have taken someone as arcane as Pope, and written a really excellent poem in his exact style. Not only that, but you write this cool antithesis of his poem, almost like a matched set. I really enjoyed reading this. There is a high level of maturity, and intellectual discipline here.
ReplyDeleteThis poem is really good. I enjoyed the incorporation of an older dialect of English and I almost thought your poem was a continuation of Pope's poem before I saw the title.
ReplyDeleteAll I can say is wow. Like Jared said, I could hardly tell where one poem ended and the next one began. It's so intellectual and formal, overall it's just a really cool piece.
ReplyDeleteThis was so well written! Like everyone else has said, it really does sound like an extension of the original poem. I also thought that the dialect of English really added to the style of the poem that made it really similar to the original poem. This is really an incredible poem, great job!
ReplyDeleteWow, Sam, just wow. If I didn't know that you had written that, I definitely would have said that was your poet's poem. You did such a great job with your vocabulary and I liked how you didn't the opposite of the poem you emulated! Great job!
ReplyDeletethat's really good. At first i was reading Pope's poem, thinking it was yours, so I think you might want to make yours more distinct with using bold, or a different color or something. your poem though, was extremely well written. It was very parallel to the original. Great job!
ReplyDeleteThis was reallyyyy crazy good! Like everybody else said, I didn't know where the two poems separated, but since you had mirrored it and used high vocabulary and good like everything else that the poet did, it was so good! Nice job:)
ReplyDeleteWow Sam! That was really good, you taken something written in like olden days, and keep that essence, but make it new. Nice job!
ReplyDelete