'A Thought for a Lonely Death-Bed' by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1845)

Poetry

A Thought for a Lonely Death-Bed

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1845)

Written at the request of my friend Miss Cockell, to whom it is inscribed If God compel thee to this destiny, To die alone,—with none beside thy bed To ruffle round with sobs thy last word said And mark with tears the pulses ebb from thee,— Pray then alone,—“O Christ, come tenderly! By thy forsaken Sonship—and the red Drear wine-press,—and the wilderness out-spread,— And the lone garden where thine agony Fell bloody from thy brow,—by all of those Permitted desolations, comfort mine! No earthly friend being near me, interpose No deathly angel ’twixt my face and Thine, But stoop Thyself to gather my life’s rose, And smile away my mortal to Divine!”


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