When Dead

It will be much better when

I am under the bough;

I shall be more myself, Dear, then,

Than I am now.

No sign of querulousness

To wear you out

Shall I show there:  strivings and stress

Be quite without.

This fleeting life-brief blight

Will have gone past

When I resume my old and right

Place in the Vast.

And when you come to me

To show you true,

Doubt not I shall infallibly

Be waiting for you.

Thomas Hardy