52 Songs, Week 11: "Love and Death" by The Waterboys

Have you ever read Elizabeth Barrett Browning's poem about "How Do I Love Thee?  Let me count the ways..."  The ending lines run so:

...With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
 
At college, one of my professors gave a lecture entitled, "The Apostle Paul and The Goddess Pomona: Love As Strong As Death."  It was about the connections between the Roman goddess who named my college and the apostle who spread and grew the Christian church - that death did not divide but make them one under the golden arch of heaven.
 
A few years later my own dad died, and I learned about love and death.  Death does not destroy; death transforms.  Love is not bound by life. 
 
And then there are The Waterboys, never shy to take on all kinds of interesting topics.  This is their song, "Love and Death."
 
Behold the flashing waters

A cloven dancing jet,
That from the milk-white marble
Forever foam and fret;
Far off in drowsy valleys
Where the meadow saffrons blow,
The feet of summer dabble
In their coiling calm and slow.
The banks are worn forever
By a people sadly gay:
A Titan with loud laughter,
Made them of fire clay.
Go ask the springing flowers,
And the flowing air above,
What are the twin-born waters,
And they'll answer Death and Love.

With wreaths of withered flowers
Two lonely spirits wait
With wreaths of withered flowers
'Fore paradise's gate.
They may not pass the portal
Poor earth-enkindled pair,
Though sad is many a spirit
To pass and leave them there
Still staring at their flowers,
That dull and faded are.
If one should rise beside thee,
The other is not far.
Go ask the youngest angel,
She will say with bated breath,
By the door of Mary's garden
Are the spirits Love and Death