I

   I saw a dead man’s finer part

Shining within each faithful heart

Of those bereft.  Then said I: “This must be

      His immortality.”

II

   I looked there as the seasons wore,

And still his soul continuously upbore

Its life in theirs.  But less its shine excelled

      Than when I first beheld.

III

   His fellow-yearsmen passed, and then

In later hearts I looked for him again;

And found him—shrunk, alas! into a thin

      And spectral mannikin.

IV

   Lastly I ask—now old and chill—

If aught of him remain unperished still;

And find, in me alone, a feeble spark,

      Dying amid the dark.

February 1899.