ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON. Image source Google

 

Home they brought her warrior dead:
         She nor swoon’d nor utter’d cry:
All her maidens, watching, said,
         “She must weep or she will die.”
 
Then they praised him, soft and low,
         Call’d him worthy to be loved,
Truest friend and noblest foe;
         Yet she neither spoke nor moved.
 
Stole a maiden from her place,
         Lightly to the warrior stepped,
Took the face-cloth from the face;
         Yet she neither moved nor wept.
 
Rose a nurse of ninety years,
         Set his child upon her knee—
Like summer tempest came her tears—
         “Sweet my child, I live for thee.”
 
BY ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

Home they brought her warrior dead. Image source: Google

Home They Brought Her Warrior Dead..

​Home They Brought Her Warrior Dead is a lyrical poem written by Alfred Lord Tennyson. This poem is about suppressed grief. The body of a dead warrior is brought home to his wife but she has no reaction to this and is too shocked to show any emotion. The maidens waiting on her conclude that if she does not cry, all the bottled up grief inside her will kill her. The first attempt to make her weep by praising the warrior, calling him a true friend and a noble foe, goes in vain and does not change her state of shock. A maiden then goes over to the dead body and removes the cloth covering the dead warrior’s face, hoping for grief to flow, but that doesn’t work either. Finally a ninety year old nurse, places their child upon her knees, and the wife’s tears roll down like a summer storm and she says, “Sweet my child I live for thee…” by which she means that the sole purpose of her life was to live for their child only.