Why be afraid of Death as though your life were breath!
Death but anoints your eyes with clay. O glad surprise!
Why should you be forlorn? Death only husks the corn.
Why should you fear to meet the thresher of the wheat?
Is sleep a thing to dread? Yet sleeping, you are dead
Till you awake and rise, here, or beyond the skies.
Why should it be a wrench to leave your wooden bench,
Why not with happy shout run home when school is out?
The dear ones left behind! O foolish one and blind.
A day--and you will meet,--a night--and you will greet!
This is the death of Death, to breathe away a breath
And know the end of strife, and taste the deathless life,
And joy without a fear, and smile without a tear,
And work, nor care nor rest, and find the last the best.
--Maltbie D. Babcock.