#thanatopsis

[predictablesloth]

To him who in the love of Nature holds   

Communion with her visible forms...

She glides into his darker musings, with a mild   

And healing sympathy, that steals away   

Their sharpness, ere he is aware.

[deadpoetsfellowship]

To him who in the love of Nature holds    Communion with her visible forms, she speaks    A various language; for his gayer hours    She has a voice of gladness, and a smile    And eloquence of beauty, and she glides    Into his darker musings, with a mild    And healing sympathy, that steals away    Their sharpness, ere he is aware.  When thoughts    Of the last bitter hour come like a blight    Over thy spirit, and sad images    Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,    And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,    Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;—    Go forth, under the open sky, and list    To Nature’s teachings, while from all around—  Earth and her waters, and the depths of air—  Comes a still voice— Yet a few days, and thee    The all-beholding sun shall see no more    In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,    Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,    Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist    Thy image.   Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim    Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,  And, lost each human trace, surrendering up    Thine individual being, shalt thou go    To mix for ever with the elements,    To be a brother to the insensible rock    And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain    Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak    Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.        Yet not to thine eternal resting-place    Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish    Couch more magnificent.  Thou shalt lie down    With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings,    The powerful of the earth—the wise, the good,    Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,    All in one mighty sepulchre.   The hills    Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun,—the vales    Stretching in pensive quietness between;    The venerable woods—rivers that move    In majesty, and the complaining brooks    That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,    Old Ocean’s gray and melancholy waste,—    Are but the solemn decorations all    Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,    The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,    Are shining on the sad abodes of death,    Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread    The globe are but a handful to the tribes    That slumber in its bosom.—Take the wings    Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness,    Or lose thyself in the continuous woods    Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,    Save his own dashings—yet the dead are there:    And millions in those solitudes, since first    The flight of years began, have laid them down    In their last sleep—the dead reign there alone.  So shalt thou rest, and what if thou withdraw    In silence from the living, and no friend    Take note of thy departure? All that breathe    Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh  When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care    Plod on, and each one as before will chase    His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave    Their mirth and their employments, and shall come  And make their bed with thee. As the long train    Of ages glide away, the sons of men,    The youth in life’s green spring, and he who goes    In the full strength of years, matron and maid,    The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man—    Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,    By those, who in their turn shall follow them.         So live, that when thy summons comes to join    The innumerable caravan, which moves    To that mysterious realm, where each shall take    His chamber in the silent halls of death,    Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,    Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed    By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,    Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch    About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

[plantley]

“do you ever feel like a dead fox carcass, on the side of the road, rotting with nasty flesh” to the tune of firework by katy perry

[landschaftsmalerei]

Landschaftsszene aus Thanatopsis, 1850 von Asher Brown Durand

[onecontinuoussigh]

I kinda fell all over myself over this painting this morning. Scene for Thanatopsis by Asher Brown Durand. So then I had to read the poem from William Cullen Bryant, and this was my favorite excerpt:

[dare-g]

Thanatopsis (1991)

[comparativetarot]

Death. Art by Celeste Pille, from The American Renaissance Tarot.

“Presenting the Death card for The American Renaissance Tarot. Our inspiration for the image was a detail of a panoramic painting showing the cross-section of an Indian burial mound under excavation. Native Americans in the nineteenth century reported that these mounds were relics of a lost people, which opened the door wide for speculation about the racial identity of the Mississippi Mound Builders. The mystic Joseph Smith imagined that these ancient Americans were descendants of the lost tribes of Israel, while other nineteenth-century thinkers rather absurdly theorized that the Mound Builders had been white. Our literary inspiration for the Death card is William Cullen Bryant, one of the most talented poets of the period. Bryant’s poetry is suffused with consciousness of death and transience, beginning with his early hit, 'Thanatopsis,' meaning a 'meditation on death.' In 'The Prairies,' Bryant employs his favorite trope: that our steps disturb the millions sleeping in the bosom of earth. He weaves a fantasy about the ancient Mound Builders, and then concludes, 'Thus change the forms of being. Thus arise/ Races of living things, glorious in strength,/ And perish, as the quickening breath of God/ Fills them, or is withdrawn.' The celestial mirror of the Great Serpent Mound in Ohio appears in the sky.” — Thea Wirsching

[jesusonmyheartthrone]

Thanatopsis

Lamentation for Those Lost at Sea

In the ocean depths, in secret caves

Hidden fathoms beneath the sparkling waves,

There is a city truly fantastic, surreal,

Where dwell the seahorse, squid and eel.

But it isn't the countless fish alone

That inhabit that realm of coral and stone.

The great Poseidon, Sea God and King -

So elusive and strange and mighty a being -

Resides there also in the murky gloom,

Within a vast and resplendent throne room,

From which he governs the oceans wide,

Including the spirits of those who died

While within the sea's cold grip -

A terrible, ancient and remorseless crypt.

That aquatic city is glorious indeed,

Bedecked with streamers of green seaweed,

And adorned with oysters opened wide

To reveal the pearls stored inside.

Spires arise from their coral bases

Like mammoth, exotic Greek vases,

Striated with glittering precious gems,

And colorful urchins on glassy stems.

Monstrously odd fish swim amid the shells,

Casting dazzling, mystical spells,

Their bodies able to create light,

And thus stave off the endless night,

While above the city, where it remains dark,

Constantly patrols the shark.

The mermaids there sing their song

With wailing voices, amongst the throng,

While kelpies listen, mesmerized,

By the eerie melodies hypnotized.

Resting scattered all around that place

Are ships that vanished without a trace,

Their ribbed hulls mostly overgrown,

Where they sank and died alone -

Claimed forever by the briny deep,

Where mermaids sing, and the Sea God sleeps.

The treasures within those sunken galleys spread

Are the couches of the dead,

Whose spirits eternally sing

Lamentations before the great Sea King,

Whose heartless laughter like thunder rolls

Over those melancholy, hopeless souls.

And the mermaids pause and wonder why

All living things must suffer and die,

But not one spirit within that city

Is touched or comforted by their pity.

The poetry of another Tumblr inspired this one. Haven't penned a thanatopsis often, but this one I actually enjoyed creating.