"Song" by Christina Rossetti

SONG.

When I am dead, my dearest,
    Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
    Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
    With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
    And if thou wilt, forget.

I shall not see the shadows,
    I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
    Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
    That doth not rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,
    And haply may forget.


Source of the text - Christina Rossetti, The Complete Poems of Christina Rossetti, edited by Rebecca W. Crump. New York: Penguin Classics, 2001, p. 52.

TJB: Expecting to die first, the poet provides tough lyrical instructions for her lover & makes only safe predictions. Why worry what he will do?