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Oh, I who so wanted to own some earth,
Am consumed by the earth instead:
Blood into river
Bone into land
The grave restores what finds its bed.
Oh, I who did drink of Spring's fragrant clay,
Gives back its wine for other men:
Breath into air
Heart into grass
My heart bereft-I might rest then.
Requiem was used as an allusion in this poem. Requiem is a Mass or song for the repose of the dead. By knowing the definition of requiem the poem now appears to be celebrating and paying resect to the dead. The lines "...Am consumed by the earth instead... "(Spencer 2) shows that the person has died and was buried. The rest of the poem then continues to pay respect to the dead by describing their rebirth.
In the poem, as the different body parts turn into the environment it is a symbol of rebirth. The line "...The grave restores what finds its bed"(Spencer 5) shows that once the person was buried they were then reborn into various aspects of the environment. Anne Spencer shows that nothing ends after death and a new beginning starts.
If ever a garden was a Gethsemane,
with old tombs set high against
the crumpled olive tree—and lichen
this, my garden has been to me.
For such as I none other is so sweet;
Lacking old tombs, here stands my grief,
and certainly its ancient tree.
Peace is here and in every season
a quiet beauty.
The sky falling about me
evenly to the compass. . .
What is sorrow but tenderness now
in this earth-close frame of land and sky
falling constantly into horizons
of east and west, north and south;
what is pain but happiness here
amid these green and wordless patterns,--
indefinite texture of blade and leaf;
Beauty of an old, old tree,
last comfort in Gethsemane.