A DISCOURSE WITH DEATH

(TGM funeral 21.xi.1937)

You, noted, rated more than gold is rated,

you, who keeps all, forever unrebated,

you, in whose arms a man forgets, abandoned,

all the world’s burdens, yourself never burdened,

you, who decrees that pain be suffered, cruelly,

by all the living, yourself unpained surely,

you, who arrives, certain of takings, steady,

you, whose arrival finds none truly ready,

you, Death, the dancer round life, never ending,

you, against whom there can be no defending

with steel, nor marble statues, temples vaulted,

you, guide of the deceased through the exalted,

you, the sole constant in this world applying,

here: See, the catafalque, the body lying,

take it, the best we have you’re being given

by this sad nation, whose bereavement’s riven

by a loss greater than your hunger, sated,

you, who keeps all, forever unrebated,

take him on your deep lap to cradle, centered

in that deep shade, which dawn light’s never entered,

to rest in peace, in just, commensurate station.

Above his grave, there stands a living nation.