Percy Bysshe Shelley

Death (1)

Misery personified

Shelley makes Misery a character who sits by graves calling roll. The Youth with white hair IS Misery—grief has aged him prematurely.

I
They die—the dead return not—Misery
Sits near an open grave and calls them over,

Misery personified

Shelley makes Misery a character who sits by graves calling roll. The Youth with white hair IS Misery—grief has aged him prematurely.

Misery personified

Shelley makes Misery a character who sits by graves calling roll. The Youth with white hair IS Misery—grief has aged him prematurely.

A Youth with hoary hair and haggard eye—
They are the names of kindred, friend and lover,
Which he so feebly calls—they all are gone—5
Fond wretch, all dead! those vacant names alone,

Vacant names

Names without bodies. He's calling out names of the dead like attendance at school, but no one answers—the names are empty signifiers now.

Structural repetition

The entire poem repeats itself—both stanzas end with identical lines. The repetition mirrors grief's obsessive, circular nature.

This most familiar scene, my pain—
These tombs—alone remain.

Structural repetition

The entire poem repeats itself—both stanzas end with identical lines. The repetition mirrors grief's obsessive, circular nature.

II

My sweetest friend

He addresses Misery as his closest companion. When everyone else has died, grief is all that remains with him.

Misery, my sweetest friend—oh, weep no more!
Thou wilt not be consoled—I wonder not!
For I have seen thee from thy dwelling's door
Watch the calm sunset with them, and this spot
Was even as bright and calm, but transitory,
And now thy hopes are gone, thy hair is hoary;
This most familiar scene, my pain—

Structural repetition

The entire poem repeats itself—both stanzas end with identical lines. The repetition mirrors grief's obsessive, circular nature.

Structural repetition

The entire poem repeats itself—both stanzas end with identical lines. The repetition mirrors grief's obsessive, circular nature.

These tombs—alone remain.
Source Wikipedia Poetry Foundation

Reading Notes

The Grammar of Grief

Shelley uses dashes obsessively—eleven in sixteen lines. They create a stuttering, interrupted rhythm that mimics someone barely holding themselves together. Notice how "They die—the dead return not—Misery" lurches from thought to thought without smooth transitions. This is how actual grief sounds in the mind.

The poem's pronouns shift confusingly. Stanza I uses "he" (third person), but stanza II switches to "thou" (second person), directly addressing Misery. Then the refrain says "my pain"—first person. Shelley blurs the boundaries between observer, sufferer, and grief itself. They're all the same person at different distances.

"Hoary" means white or gray with age. The Youth has white hair—grief has aged him overnight. This isn't metaphor; extreme stress can actually cause hair to gray rapidly (Marie Antoinette syndrome). Shelley makes psychological trauma visible on the body.

Why It Repeats

The poem literally repeats itself—both stanzas end with the same three lines. This isn't a refrain; it's obsessive repetition. Grief circles back to the same thoughts: the familiar scene, the pain, the tombs.

Shelley wrote this around 1815-16, during a period when he'd lost contact with his children from his first marriage and faced multiple deaths in his circle. By 1822, he'd lose his friend Keats, his son William, and eventually drown himself at age 29. The poem's premature aging ("hoary hair" on a youth) would prove prophetic.

The sunset image in stanza II matters. "Watch the calm sunset with them"—past tense. The sunset was "bright and calm, but transitory." Everything beautiful is temporary. Now only tombs remain permanent. Shelley inverts the usual association: nature passes, stone endures.