Poems (Mary Coleridge)/Poem 214
CCXIV
I envy not the dead that rest, The souls that sing and fly;Not for the sake of all the Blest, Am I content to die.
If ever men were laid in earth, And might in earth repose,Where spirits have no second birth— Those, those, I envy, those.
My being would I gladly give, Rejoicing to be freed;But if for ever I must live, Then let me live indeed.
What peace could ever be to me The joy that strives with strife?What blissful immortality So sweet as struggling life?