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Home  »  A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895  »  Thaisa’s Dirge

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895.

Herman Charles Merivale b. 1839

Thaisa’s Dirge

THAISA fair, under the cold sea lying,

Sleeps the long sleep denied to her by Earth;

We, adding sighs unto the wild winds’ sighing,

With all our mourning under-mourn her worth:

The white waves toss their crested plumes above her,

Round sorrowing faces with the salt spray wet;

All are her lovers that once learn’d to love her,

And never may remember to forget;

Shells for her pillow Amphitrite bringeth,

And sad nymphs of the dank weed weave her shroud;

Old Triton’s horn her dirge to Ocean singeth,

Whose misty caverns swell the echo loud;

And, while the tides rock to and fro her bier,

What was Thaisa lies entombed here.