. To represent a field of grain as "gazing" is to show evidence of continuing engagement with the world, whether in labor or leisure, in adulthood, but also suggesting an effort at searching out meaning. But the carriage not only simply passes the field by but also passes the setting sun, which stands for the aging process. In the first line of the fourth stanza the poet makes a sharp correction about what happened during the carriage ride ("Or rather--He passed Us"), which suggests that childhood, adulthood, and old age, as extended as they may seem, are all a mere instant of time compared to immortality, the province of death. At this moment the poet, clad in the light material (doubtless a shroud), gets a chill, which suggests an emotionally disturbing, possibly regretful, recognition that fleeting life passed more or less unheeded, until old age made it impossible to turn back time and start striving for activity and meaning.
But the poet does not complain. The house before which they pause is the grave site, are not encountered with dread but merely described. And the carriage only pauses, for the grave is not the "real" terminus of life; Eternity is, as the last stanza illustrates. The last stanza is somewhat ambiguous: The poet expr
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