Ah, Are You Digging on My Grave

The poem opens with a question uttered by a deceased speaker lying within a grave: “‘Ah, are you digging on my grave / My loved one?—planting rue?’” (Lines 1-2). The first line sets a pattern for a refrain that will take slightly different forms in each stanza, with the speaker attempting to guess who the mystery visitor at her gravesite is. The speaker is then answered by the mystery visitor, who reveals the unfortunate truth about the person the speaker has mentioned. The speaker’s first guess is that her “loved one”—a romantic partner—has come to mourn and commemorate her, perhaps even planting the flower “rue” as a symbol of his sorrow. However, the mystery visitor reveals that the speaker’s beloved has recently “wed” (Line 3) another woman instead of remaining faithful to the dead speaker’s memory. The beloved justified his transfer of affections by reasoning that, since his former love is now deceased, “It cannot hurt her now [...] / That I should not be true’” (Lines 5-6). This indifference on the part of the beloved towards the deceased speaker is the first of several disillusionments the speaker will experience as the poem progresses.

In the second stanza, the same pattern plays out. The speaker takes another guess, wondering if “My nearest dearest kin” (Line 8) are the ones at her gravesite. But the visitor reveals bad news about the deceased speaker’s family members: They have no interest in tending to her grave or planting flowers in her memory. The practically minded and pragmatic family simply asks, “What use! / What good will planting flowers produce?” (Lines 9-10) now that the speaker is dead. Since “No tendance of her mound can loose / Her spirit from Death’s gin” (Lines 11-12), they regard visiting and tending the grave as nothing more than a meaningless chore.

In the third stanza, the speaker changes tack, asking if perhaps the mystery visitor is someone motivated by hatred instead of love: “But someone digs upon my grave? / My enemy?—prodding sly?” (Lines 13-14). But it turns out that the feelings of the deceased speaker’s enemy have also been tempered by time and mortality: Since the speaker is now dead, her former rival “thought you no more worth her hate / And cares not where you lie” (Lines 17-18). Just as love has been proven to be fleeting in the face of death, so too has enmity. The speaker is, once again, considered to be of no further importance in the eyes of someone she once knew.

In the fourth stanza, the speaker asks the visitor to reveal himself, “since I have not guessed!” (Line 20) the visitor’s identity. The visitor explains that he is, “Your little dog, who still lives near” (Line 22) the gravesite. The dog at first appears to have genuine consideration and concern for the speaker, adding, “And much I hope my movements here / Have not disturbed your rest?” (Lines 23-24). In the fifth stanza, the deceased speaker responds to the dog’s reveal with relief and joy, rhapsodizing about how “one true heart was left behind!” after all (Line 27). The speaker praises the dog’s apparent loyalty and purity of feeling for her, asking rhetorically, “What feeling do we ever find / To equal among human kind / A dog’s fidelity!” (Lines 28-30).

And yet, in the poem’s sixth and final stanza, the deceased speaker is disillusioned again: The dog’s visit to the gravesite was not motivated by loyalty or love for his former owner. Rather, the dog simply wanted “To bury a bone” (Line 32) as a snack for himself in future, as he happens to pass by the gravesite each day during his “daily trot” (Line 34). What is more, the dog admits that he did not even initially recognize the site as the gravesite of his former owner: “I am sorry, but I quite forgot / It was your resting place” (Lines 35-36). The poem therefore ends with a final ironic twist: In spite of the deceased speaker’s desperation to be remembered and honored by those she once loved, even her little dog has forgotten all about her.