POE TRY.
EPHEMERIS.
(THE MAT-FLT.) You fluttered forth above the sedge, Fulfilled with joy of living, You danced along the water's edge Without the least misgiving : Yet, fluttering, dancing, nearer drew, By some strange impulse bidden, To that bright surface where, I knew, Your certain doom lay hidden.
Then, underneath the alder boughs, You lighted on an eddy, As if your sunlit hour's carouse Had wearied you already : And, while you preened your gauzy wings, A cheerful and a gay fly, I saw the spread of circling rings, Where there had been a May-fly.
Such was your life to death from birth, And, dazzling in its brevity, It seems to set a curious worth, By contrast, on longevity ; So that, if measuring our careers.
My longer limit flatters,
I ask myself if, hours or years,
The difference really matters.
Thus do I spin your elegy,
Yet, knowing what shall follow, I feel my sentiments to be
Not only trite but hollow : One waiting for the trout to rise Admits the thought as treasonable, Yet cannot reckon your demise, Though tragic, as unseasonable.
The spot where, resolute or rash, You chose to float and founder, Conceals, to judge him by his splash, A good three-quarter-pounder : Above whose greedy nose shall sail, Just where he rose to strike you, A fly with something in his tail, Like you—yet not quite like you.
ALFRED COCHRANE.
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