The conversations and the news replete
With mention of his worth, as far and wide
The sobs of lamentation meet
With eulogies of praise
Which must continue on for days and days.
This feeling of my peers, and this
Esteem expressed on every throbbing tongue
Is shared by me, but not the grief, which is
Muted because I was but stung
Less than a week ago
With news of your death, if expected though.
Lingering illness conquered you
That made you suffer in a pain severe
Increasingly unbearable—you who
For many a gracious thirty year
Had been a friend of mine
Since I was young and sought your light to shine.
I told you of my Beatrice—
You knew the elemental origins
That drove my being and art in synthesis,
And knew the tribulations since
As I toward manhood groped
With less facility than I had hoped.
You set for me transaction’s rate,
A balance to which I might thence refer
In perpetuity; and now I wait
For my impending doom so near
Hopeful to study your
Courage and spirit facing heaven’s door.
News of this public death is like
The far illuminations of a star
Amidst the morning’s sun’s rays as they strike—
The grief for him appears so far
But overwhelming near
My all-absorbing grief for you, my dear.