As at Thy Portals Also Death
1819-1892
As at thy portals also death,
Entering thy sovereign, dim, illimitable grounds,
To memories of my mother, to the divine blending, maternity,
To her, buried and gone, yet buried not, gone not from me,
(I see again the calm benignant face fresh and beautiful still,
I sit by the form in the coffin,
I kiss and kiss convulsively again the sweet old lips, the cheeks,
the closed eyes in the coffin;)
To her, the ideal woman, practical, spiritual, of all of earth,
life, love, to me the best,
I grave a monumental line, before I go, amid these songs,
And set a tombstone here.
DayPoems Poem No. 2155
<a href="http://www.daypoems.net/poems/2155.html">As at Thy Portals Also Death by Walt Whitman</a>
The DayPoems Poetry Collection, www.daypoems.net
Timothy Bovee, editor
Poets Poems