The Poetry Corner

To John Nichol - Sonnets

By Algernon Charles Swinburne

I. Friend of the dead, and friend of all my days Even since they cast off boyhood, I salute The song saluting friends whose songs are mute With full burnt-offerings of clear-spirited praise. That since our old young years our several ways Have led through fields diverse of flower and fruit Yet no cross wind has once relaxed the root We set long since beneath the sundawns rays, The root of trust whence towered the trusty tree, Friendship this only and duly might impel My song to salutation of your own; More even than praise of one unseen of me And loved the starry spirit of Dobell, To mine by light and music only known. II. But more than this what moves me most of all To leave not all unworded and unsped The whole hearts greeting of my thanks unsaid Scarce needs this sign, that from my tongue should fall His name whom sorrow and reverent love recall, The sign to friends on earth of that dear head Alive, which now long since untimely dead The wan grey waters covered for a pall. Their trustless reaches dense with tangling stems Took never life more taintless of rebuke, More pure and perfect, more serene and kind, Than when those clear eyes closed beneath the Thames, And made the now more hallowed name of Luke Memorial to us of morning left behind.