Get out the microscope, because we’re going through this poem line-by-line.
Lines 1485-1500
If any vague desire should rise,
That holy Death ere Arthur died
Had moved me kindly from his side,
And dropt the dust on tearless eyes;
Then fancy shapes, as fancy can,
The grief my loss in him had wrought,
A grief as deep as life or thought,
But stay'd in peace with God and man.
I make a picture in the brain;
I hear the sentence that he speaks;
He bears the burthen of the weeks
But turns his burthen into gain.
His credit thus shall set me free;
And, influence-rich to soothe and save,
Unused example from the grave
Reach out dead hands to comfort me.
- Sometimes, apparently, Tennyson wishes he had died before Arthur.
- He imagines that, if this had been the case, Arthur would have handled his grief a bit better. Arthur wouldn't have lost his faith, like Tennyson has. He would have "stay'd in peace with God and man."
- The speaker continues to imagine what this scenario would look like. Arthur would bear his grief better, turning it to good.
- This thought really comforts Tennyson. It's like Arthur's "dead hands" are "reach[ing]" out from the grave to make him feel better. Aw—when's the last time "dead hands" gave you a warm and fuzzy feeling?