[A. E. Stallings]

The Greek anthology is full of these things.

X.J. Kennedy has one I love. It reminds me a bit of Housman's Revolution, in its conceit of the shadow of night going round the earth like a jump rope. Small but perfect:

Little Elegy
for a child who skipped rope

Here lies resting, out of breath,
Out of turns, Elizabeth
Whose quicksilver toes not quite
Cleared the whirring edge of night.

Earth whose circles round us skim
Till they catch the lightest limb,
Shelter now Elizabeth
And for her sake trip up death.


And this one always gets me:

Aphra Behn

Epitaph on the Tombstone of a Child, the Last of Seven that Died Before

This little, silent, gloomy monument,
Contains all that was sweet and innocent;
The softest prattler that e'er found a tongue,
His voice was music and his words a song;
Which now each list'ning angel smiling hears,
Such pretty harmonies compose the spheres;
Wanton as unfledg'd cupids, ere their charms
Had learn'd the little arts of doing harms;
Fair as young cherubins, as soft and kind,
And though translated, could not be refin'd;
The seventh dear pledge the nuptial joys had given,
Toil'd here on Earth, retir'd to rest in Heaven;
Where they the shining host of angels fill,
Spread their gay wings before the throne, and smile.