I Died for Beauty but Was Scarce
I Died for Beauty but Was Scarce - meaning Summary
Beauty and Truth Entwined
The poem presents a brief, imagined encounter between two deceased speakers laid in adjacent graves: one who “died for beauty” and one who died for truth. In quiet dialogue they recognize their aims as kindred, claiming that beauty and truth are inseparable. Their conversation continues as nature quietly reclaims their bodies and names, suggesting the erasure of individual distinction by mortality and time. The poem compresses ethical and metaphysical ideas into a simple scene, using the tomb setting to explore how ideals persist, merge, and are ultimately humbled by death.
Read Complete AnalysesI died for beauty but was scarce Adjusted in the tomb, When one who died for truth was lain In an adjoining room. He questioned softly why I failed? ‘For beauty,’ I replied. ‘And I for truth,–the two are one; We brethren are,’ he said. And so, as kinsmen met a night, We talked between the rooms, Until the moss had reached our lips, And covered up our names.
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