The To-be-forgotten

I       I heard a small sad sound,   And stood awhile among the tombs around:  "Wherefore, old friends," said I, "are you distrest,       Now, screened from life's unrest?"II       —"O not at being here;   But that our future second death is near;   When, with the living, memory of us numbs,       And blank oblivion comes!

II      "These, our sped ancestry,  Lie here embraced by deeper death than we;  Nor shape nor thought of theirs can you descry      With keenest backward eye.

IV     "They count as quite forgot;  They are as men who have existed not;  Theirs is a loss past loss of fitful breath;      It is the second death.

V     "We here, as yet, each day  Are blest with dear recall; as yet, can say  We hold in some soul loved continuance      Of shape and voice and glance.

VI     "But what has been will be —  First memory, then oblivion's swallowing sea;  Like men foregone, shall we merge into those      Whose story no one knows.

II     "For which of us could hope  To show in life that world-awakening scope  Granted the few whose memory none lets die,      But all men magnify?

II     "We were but Fortune's sport;  Things true, things lovely, things of good report  We neither shunned nor sought… We see our bourne,      And seeing it we mourn."Composition date is unknown - the above date represents the first publication date.

The lyrical form of this poem is aabb.2. among: \