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 meThe joy that strives with strife?What blissful immortalitySo sweet as struggling life?