Anna

The pale discrowned stacks of maize,     Like spectres in the sun,     Stand shivering nigh Avonaise,     Where all is dead and gone.     The sere leaves make a music vain,     With melancholy chords;     Like cries from some old battle-plain,     Like clash of phantom swords.     But when the maize was lush and green     With musical green waves,     She went, its plumed ranks between,     Unto the hill of graves.     There you may see sweet flowers set     Oer damsels and oer dames,     Rose, Ellen, Mary, Margaret,     The sweet old quiet names.     The gravestones show in long array,     Though white or green with moss,     How linked in Life and Death are they,     The Shamrock and the Cross.     The gravestones face the Golden East,     And in the morn they take     The blessing of the Great High Priest,     Before the living wake.     Who was she? Never ask her name,     Her beauty and her grace     Have passed, with her poor little shame,     Into the Silent Place.     In Avonaise, in Avonaise,     Where all is dead and done,     The folk who rest there all their days     Care not for moon or sun.     They care not, when the living pass,     Whether they sigh or smile;     They hear above their graves the grass     That sighs, A little while!     A white stone marks her small green bed     With Anna and Adieu.     Madonna Mary, rest her head     On your dear lap of blue!