Remember — Christina Rossetti

Remember me when I am gone away,Gone far away into the silent land;When you can no more hold me by the hand,Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.Remember me when no more day by dayYou tell me of our future that you planned:Only remember me; you understandIt will be late to counsel then or pray.Yet if you should forget me for a whileAnd afterwards remember, do not grieve:For if the darkness and corruption leaveA vestige of the thoughts that once I had,Better by far you should forget and smileThan that you should remember and be sad.

About the poem

Christina Rossetti wrote this sonnet at nineteen, though it was not published until 1862, in Goblin Market and Other Poems. In the first eight lines she asks to be remembered when she has «gone away / Into the silent land», when no one can hold her by the hand any longer.

But in the final turn the poem turns against its own plea: if remembering her must bring sorrow, she would rather be forgotten. «Better by far you should forget and smile / Than that you should remember and be sad.» It is a rare generosity in the poetry of grief, and the poem's quiet strength.