LIKE burnt-out torches by a sick man's bed
Gaunt cypress-trees stand round the sun-bleached stone;
Here doth the little night-owl make her throne,
And the slight lizard show his jewelled head.
And, where the chaliced poppies flame to red,
In the still chamber of yon pyramid
Surely some Old-World Sphinx lurks darkly hid,
Grim warder of this pleasaunce of the dead.
Ah! sweet indeed to rest within the womb
Of Earth, great mother of eternal sleep,
But sweeter far for thee a restless tomb
In the blue cavern of an echoing deep,
Or where the tall ships founder in the gloom
Against the rocks of some wave-shattered steep.
The grave of Shelley is in the same Cemetery where Keats is buried (Non-Chatolic Cemetery, in Rome)
Excellent! A befitting lyrical portrait of the final resting place of the ashes of the 'restless' volcano that was Shelley. A masterly tribute to an unparalleled master.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
Oscar Wilde was a poet - par excellence. His tribute here to Shelley is a measure only a masterly poet can bestow upon another.