The poem “Verses Written on Her Deathbed” was published in 1755 in the collection Poems by Eminent Ladies. It was originally written in 1715, by Mary Monck as she lay on her deathbed far away from her husband. In some places, the title of the poem is “Verses Written on Her Deathbed at Bath to Her Husband in London”. Even in her last days, she was apart from him, and she wrote this poem as her final goodbye to the man she loved.

This 22-line poem makes use of 11 rhyming couplets, so the rhyme scheme is AABBCCDD and so on. It details the last words of a long-suffering dying woman to her loving husband. Her love kept her alive for some time, but now she walks willingly into the arms of death. She implores her husband to rejoice in her death, and not grieve her, as she is moving on to a better place. Monck died of consumption, and this poem serves as a reminder that for the chronically ill, death sometimes comes as a release at the end of years of pain.

Verses Written On Her Death-Bed | Summary And Analysis

Verses Written On Her Death | Analysis, Lines 1-12

Thou, who dost all my worldly thoughts employ,

Thou pleasing source of all my earthly joy:

Thou tend’rest husband, and thou best of friends,

To thee this first, this last adieu I send.

At length the conqu’ror death asserts his right,

And will for ever veil me from thy sight.

He wooes me to him with a chearful grace;

And not one terror clouds his meagre face.

He promises a lasting rest from pain;

And shews that all life’s fleeting joys are vain.

 Th’ eternal scenes of heav’n he sets in view,

And tells me that no other joys are true.

This poem is written directly addressing her husband, who is not with her. This makes use of the device apostrophe, which means to speak to an absent person, or an abstract idea. The entire poem uses apostrophe, as she writes this poem in her loneliness as she is far away from her husband who is in London.

He fills up every thought in her head, and she sees him as the foundation for her happiness. They are a picture-perfect couple, and it is clear that he is not a brash man at all. Her assertions of his tenderness and friendship show that the relationship was strong and caring, and rich with love. He is gentle with her and kind to her, and they live a happy life together. She refers to him as the “best of friends”, which shows that they have a healthy relationship, and so it was to him she wanted to speak as she felt death coming near.

Death is personified as a conqueror, as he rules over the dead, and thus has a right to the life of those he takes away. He has no qualms about taking her from the earth, even though she does not want to leave her husband in sadness. However, he does not forcibly hide her away from her husband, but gently woos her, trying to convince her to walk to him willingly. Her death will not be abrupt, as he shows her the joys that await her in the afterlife, and she chooses to take that step toward it. He approaches her cheerfully, offering her an escape from the suffering that she has faced for so long. Death does not terrify her, and she consciously chooses to take him up on his promise of peace, tranquility, and an eternal lack of pain.

There is a contrast between the belief of the poet and the promises of death. Death endeavours to convince her to go with him by convincing her that the joys on Earth are transient, and barely a true reality. He shows her the relaxation that awaits her in heaven and tries to persuade her to accept that it is more valuable than her happiness with her husband. The eternity of peace in heaven is more valuable than the years of pain on Earth, and any joy that exists on earth is purely fleeting. However, this directly contradicts the poet’s assertions that her happiness lies in the hands of her loving husband, and she must accept the heavenly joy and leave her husband behind.

“To thee this first, this last adieu I send.” means that this poem is her last goodbye to him, but he will be the first person to hear it. He is the most important person in her life, so she desires to speak first to him and bid him goodbye. This is followed by her explaining why she has chosen to follow death and leave him on Earth without her. She does not leave without explanation, and this stanza is her explaining what has been going through her mind as she lay alone in Bath, dying little by little.

Here, Anaphora is used with the repetition of “Thou” in the first three lines, which emphasizes the fact that she is writing this directly to her husband, the person who she loves the most in the world.

Verses Written On Her Death | Analysis, Lines 13-22

But love, fond love, would yet resist his pow’r;

Would fain awhile defer the parting hour:

He brings thy mourning image to my eyes,

And would obstruct my journey to the skies.

But say, thou dearest, thou unwearied friend;

Say, should’st thou grieve to see my sorrows end?

Thou know’st a painful pilgrimage I’ve past ;

And should’st thou grieve that rest is come at last?

Rather rejoice to see me shake off life,

And die as I have liv’d, thy faithful wife.

Though Death tries to convince her otherwise, she knows that this love between her and her husband is enough to resist the call of death. The love that she feels for him and the love that he feels for her has the resilience and the power to stop death right in its tracks, and this strength made her want to delay the afterlife and remain with him for some more time. She chose to suffer for a little longer in order to have more time with her husband. She values worldly happiness over the escape that death gives her, which shows that she values her husband over herself. She puts more importance on making sure he does not feel the sadness of her absence and does not put much importance on a release from her pain. The thought that stops her from dying is the image of her sorrowful husband, lamenting the death of his lovely wife.

But soon, she realizes, it would be better to allow death to take her than live in suffering for longer. She calls her husband an “unwearied friend”, and this repetition emphasizes that their relationship is not purely romance, but much stronger than that. He who has been with her for so long, through her joys and sickness, would never tire of her, and never be weary of her presence. Still, he will be forced to accept her death, but she now reminds him that grief is not the appropriate response.

She uses rhetorical questions to make a strong statement, reminding him that he should not grieve, as this death is the end of her pain. She will finally truly be at rest, and thus, he should not mourn her departure, but rejoice in her freedom. Even in death, she is his “faithful wife”, so she dies the way she lived, loyal to the core. He should rejoice that she has been able to move on to a place of good health and know in his heart that it changes nothing about her fidelity and love for him. With these words, she closes the chapter of her life, and the final couplet sums up the poem, with her pleading with him to not grieve her death but to rejoice that she has moved on to better things, whilst reinforcing her love for him.

Alliteration is used in “painful pilgrimage I’ve past” and “Rather rejoice”

ABOUT THE POET

Mary Monck was born in 1678 in the United Kingdom.

She wrote poetry as a hobby and did not aim to be published. Her poetry was published posthumously under the pseudonym Marinda, and some of her works appear in Lives of the Poets and Poems and Translations under Several Occasions. She was very well-versed in Latin, Italian, and Spanish, and was an avid reader of English Literature. Unfortunately, not much more is known about her.

She died in 1715, in Bath, UK